Dish – No Knead Lemon Nigella Bread
Themes - Gracious and Good
Food/Tech Tie In – Bread Making
Homage – To all who have ditch the colorfully bagged bread.
Confession. Beyond biscuits and cornbread, I did not grow up on or with homemade bread.
In fact, if your family didn’t eat premade, pre-sliced bread from a colorful plastic bag closed with a twist tie, you were considered old fashioned and perhaps even broke-broke, which was worse than regular broke. Funny, as most of the families where the comparative data would emanate from, were on the same socio economic level, but those details were not important then. The stigma was real.
We didn’t know or appreciate the goodness of homemade bread, and/or what a gift it was to smell a fresh loaf baking in the oven. It was about efficiency in the home as our parents juggled work, getting to and from work, stretching a dollar, trying to keep up with all of the newness the world was raining down (queue: love power, soul power, cassettes, 8 tracks & hot pants), and truth be told...trying to keep up with us. It was the 70’s. Who had the time?
Meals were solved by untwisting that bag, opening that box, tearing open that package, pealing back that foil...you get it. It was about low cost, convenient food options, being/feeling modern and garnering leisure time that for the adults, may have included a highball, a cigarette, and music from the hi-fi.
As time and life evolved, I was able to get a taste of what unsliced non package bread could be, when I crossed the bridge or went through the tunnel, on my journey to becoming a New Yorker. That first Bagel, Bialy, Croissant and clutch the pearls...Brioche, was a whole other experience. I think for a short while Brioche took over NYC, and we really thought we were somebody when we snagged one on Broadway just north of Macys on the way to work. It was right up there with who we thought we were when we shopped at Balducci’s in lower Manhattan. It mattered not that we, and by we I mean “I” could barely afford the tin of “Herbes De Provence” that I coveted, I got to carry the bag on the subway as I navigated my way back to my 700 sq ft duplex on the upper west side. Big timin’ it as it were.
As nice and leveled up as all of that was, it wasn’t until I moved to Paris France in the 80’s and had my first “real” baguette, that I understood what bread could truly be. Again, I nor my friends from neighboring countries, were baking fresh bread in our smaller than NYC flats (mine had the shower in the kitchen). We purchased bread from the boulangeries that were a part of every neighborhood. You had to eat it that day or within a couple of days, as the bread, be it a baguette or a boule, did not have preservatives or modifiers for that matter. They were all divine. Be it an airy or dense variety, it mattered not. Slabs of unsalted butter, drizzles of virgin olive oil, a slice of inexpensive camembert, was all that was needed, oh...and a little vin rouge which could be purchase for the equivalent of one or two dollars then, at the Mono Prix. What? I was young and had the digestive track that youth gifts us.
Back in the USA and prior to Culinary school, I got into bread making in ernst. Initially it was via a bread machine. It was sooooooo "set it and forget it", that I progressed to experimenting with herbs and other flavorings quickly, buying 20 lbs of flour at a time, cause heaven knows what would have happened if I ran short and had to go to the grocery store. As with most obsessions, it eventually hit a pause as those weekly short compact loafs, were landing in places on my person that were not pleasing...also the squirrels found their way to those large 20 lb bags of flour, tracking it upstairs to their entry point in the eaves (a story for another time, but know, they also like chocolate covered peppermint sticks.)
Moving to Brooklyn....I got back into the bread making game, this time by hand, with a focus on baguettes. I was into it big time, and had alllll the things: the pan, the towels, the mister, the bench scraper, the lame. My neighbors in the building loved when I went into a baking frenzy as, whether the end product was on point or not...fresh hot bread from the oven, is fresh hot bread from the oven. They were welcoming recipients of my efforts.
A decade or two passed and I cant say I made another loaf until Culinary School, where I was not a fan of BPA (Baking and Pastry Arts). My friends can tell you...when there were semesters with a BPA class, a happy camper I was not, as when you really get down to it, baking is science and works off of formulas that are disguised as recipes.
Science has never been a strong suit. Like...I really had to put in the effort in every version of science class to get a “C”, and sometimes I just winged it, especially if it was multiple choice. You couldn’t just wing it in BPA. It doesn’t work, That said, as someone who evolved to a mindset of why get a “C” when you can get an “A”, I leaned in, got the “A’s, evolving to an less unhappy camper”. Today Im a camper as applies to BPA and albeit I do not bake often, when I do, its very intentional and most impactfully...it’s delicious.
So here we are.
Having worked on the formula, ok, recipe, for No Knead Lemon Nigella Bread for a couple of years, know this effort started as we came out of “the time that was” aka Covid, No Knead Bread was a thing, the way Banana Bread was as thing during Covid. I tested a few versions, playing around with ingredients and quantities. Sometimes I produced a round brick (I still say it was bad yeast 🤣), other times I got the air pockets that I dream of for a baguette but not a boule, and sometimes, it came out just right with smaller air pockets, not too dense, the perfect interior chew, and just the right amount of crusty crust.
A long way from that color twist tie bag, (not that I don’t on occasion purchase premade, pre-sliced bread...but its preservative free and I believe modifier free), a true appreciation for a warm crusty boule, freshly baked Here In My Kitchen...or yours, is what’s up. I encourage you to get your hands into some dough to make it happen, one amazing boule at a time.
BTW...If you grab your copy of the recipe from my website, feel free to make it your own. I am already progressing a rosemary and black pepper version 🤗
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