Artisan French Bread

French bread typically have only a few ingredients, are simple to make, and take a lifetime to master. This version has an option for using using fresh yeast and can be made in as little as 8 hours, although it’s best when made over a 24 hour period. The longer a bread matures, the less yeasty and more sophisticated the tastes become. Also a mature bread will stay fresh longer because the yeast is less active. I sometimes make this as a round artisan loaf in a Dutch Oven or as two small loaves in bread pans. Note that I bake in a commercial oven with a fan so your times in a conventional oven will be up to 20% longer.

Ingredients

  • 420 g Bread flour (3 cups) – can use all purpose flour but the texture will not be as good
  • 320 g Water – warm (1.5 cups)
  • 12 g Kosher salt ~1 tsp
  • 5.49 g Fresh live yeast or 1.8 g Active dry yeast (0.5 tsp)

Process

  1. Mise en Place: Measure and prepare your ingredients prior to starting.
  2. Pitch Yeast
    1. Dissolve yeast in warm water.
    2. Let rest for ~10 mins.
  3. Put flour and salt in mixer with bread hook attached. Stir for one min.
  4. With mixer on speed 1, add water mixture. Mix for 4 mins making sure all the dry flour gets incorporated into the dough.
  5. Knead: Increase mixer speed to 4 for four mins.
  6. Transfer dough to a bowl and cover with film.
  7. First Proof:
    1. For 8 hr bread: let dough rise on the counter for 8 hrs.
    2. For 24 hr bread: But in fridge to rise for 24 hrs.
  8. Second Proof:
    1. Lightly dust counter space with flour and transfer dough to the counter.
    2. Punch down dough (gently).
    3. For round loaf, shape into one round disk 2/3rds the diameter of your Dutch oven.
    4. For pan loaf bread, shape into long tube the length of your bread pan.
    5. Let rise 30 mins.
  9. Preheat oven:
    1. For round loaf set temp to 500 F, and let Dutch oven warm with oven.
    2. For bead pan loaf, set temp to 450 F.
  10. Bake
    • For round loaf, place dough in Dutch oven and score an X in the top with a knife.
    • For bread pan loaf, score a line down the length of the loaf
    • Bake for ~30 mins.
    • Bread pan should be done. Take lid of Dutch oven for round loaf and bake 5 more mins.
    • Note: Scoring lets the dough expand and moisture escape, not scoring will result in air pockets inside your finished bread.
  11. Transfer bread to cooling rack and let cool at least 20 mins before slicing. Cutting sooner will dry the bread out and it will be too soft to slice well.
  12. Bread will keep 4-5 days in a bread box, only a day or two on the counter
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