A question about a recipe: Jim Lahey No-Knead Country Loaf

I have waited the requisite 18 hours for the first rise of this bread - it certainly has spread out but I can never gauge very well if it has doubled in size. It also hasn't risen much and I didnt notice a ton of bubbles as was mentioned in the recipe. But nonetheless I punched it down. Is this similar to other people's experiences? One note is that I used 100% all purpose flour - didn't have bread flour on hand. Thanks!!

Lauren Ruben
  • 1929 views
  • 4 Comments

4 Comments

someonewhobakes November 21, 2016
Hi Lauren,
For me, at least, I definitely notice a difference with the temperature of the room the dough is rising in. If it's a little chilly, it will take longer to rise, and no harm will come to your dough if you just let it rise for another few hours until you're happy with the bulk. If you have a laundry room and a load going in the dryer, I find that dough gets pretty happy sitting on top of the dryer.
 
Lauren R. November 21, 2016
Thanks so much! It rose a bit more the second time around and I think it was because the sun was coming into the room!
 
byb November 21, 2016
Hi Lauren! To forewarn, while I've used similar recipes for bread with a long rise-time/standard bread ingredients, I've never followed Jim Lahey's to a T.

However, I know that NYT has a video about the bread that may give you a better visual of what the dough should look like: http://cooking.nytimes.com/recipes/11376-no-knead-bread

If you skip to about 2 minutes in, you'll see the dough after 19 hours. Hope that helps!
 
Lauren R. November 21, 2016
Thank you!! It did end up rising more after the second rise too!
 
Recommended by Food52