(Food Processor Version)

1. Adjust oven rack to low position and heat oven to 200 degrees. Once oven temperature reaches 200 degrees, maintain heat 10 minutes, then turn off oven heat.

2. Mix flour and salt in bowl of food processor fitted with steel blade. Add liquid ingredients; process until rough ball forms. Let dough rest 2 minutes. Process 35 seconds. Turn dough onto lightly floured surface and knead by hand, adding a little more flour if needed, until dough is smooth and satiny, 4 to 5 minutes.

3. Place dough in very lightly oiled bowl, rubbing dough around bowl to lightly coat. Cover bowl with plastic wrap; place in warm oven until dough doubles in size, 40 to 50 minutes.

4. Form dough into loaf (there's an illustration, but I can't reproduce it here - sorry), placing in greased 9-by-5-by-3-inch loaf pan.

5. Cover with plastic wrap; set aside in warm spot until dough almost doubles in size, 20 to 30 minutes. Heat oven to 350 degrees, placing empty loaf pan on bottom rack. Bring 2 C water to boil.

6. Remove plastic wrap from loaf pan. Place pan in oven, immediately pouring boiling water in empty loaf pan; (again, I can't put the illustration here.....) close oven door. Bake until instant-read thermometer inserted at an angle from short end just above pan rim into center of loaf reaches 195 degrees, about 40 to 50 minutes. Remove bread from pan, transfer to a wire rack, and cool to room temperature. Slice and serve.

A few variation:

Whole wheat: Substitute 1 1/3 C whole wheat flour for 1 1/3 C all-purpose flour. Increase first first to 50 to 60 minutes, and second rise to 40 minutes.

Oatmeal: Bring 3/4 C water to boil in small saucepan. Add 3/4 C rolled oats; cook to soften slightly, about 90 seconds. Follow above recipe, decreasing flour from 3 1/2 C to 2 3/4 C, adding the cooked oatmeal to flour and omitting the warm water from the wet ingredients.

Cornmeal: Bring 1/2 C water to boil in small saucepan. Slowly whisk in 1/4 C cornmeal. Cook, stirring constantly, until mixture thickens, about 1 minutes. Follow above recipe, decreasing flour to 3 1//4 C, decreasing milk to 3/4 C, and adding cornmeal mixture to flour (before incorporating liquids).

Anadama: Follow cornmeal loaf recipe, substituting molasses for honey.

Now, then, I tried to master recipe (white bread) over the last weekend, and found that it turned out a wonderful tasting loaf, but the crust turned out much too chewy for me. I will try it next week, brushing the crust with butter to see if that makes a difference. The magazine article deals with trying to recreate American sandwich bread, but I don't think this quite succeeds. It is, however, a nice bread made with minimal effort and no bread machine. (I love my bread machine, but slicing those cylindrical loaves is maddening sometimes.....)

from Cook's Illustrated 6/96

>From: phyllis.johnpoll@ncsl.org (Phyllis Johnpoll)