So rarely with my bread baking do I think far enough ahead of time to make a starter Saturday night, which is of course the night before bread baking day. But often I want to try out some of the more rustic or european bread recipes, which almost exclusively call for a starter. Last week I found one, however, that only had a starter that only needed to sit for a couple of minutes, not overnight. It was King Arthur’s Country Loaf, and while it doesn’t quite make up for the taste of a real starter, it definitely made a tasty bread.

The “starter” consists of water, yeast and a whole grain flour, mixed together and allowed to sit until bubbly. There is no fat in the original recipe, though King Arthur recommends substituting some of the water for oil if you would like the bread to stay fresher longer, which I always do. There wasn’t any instruction on when exactly to add the oil, so I included it in my starter.

I waited probably a half an hour for some change to occur, but my starter never got bubbly. I don’t know if it was the oil or what, but I gave up and went on with the recipe.

The majority of the flour is added slowly to incorporate it into the dough. It was pretty sticky at this point, and I switched to my dough hooks for kneading.

After about eight minutes of kneading with a short break in the middle, the dough was smooth, tacky but not super sticky, and was pulling away from the bowl on its own.

I let the first rise go pretty long, partly because I was eating dinner at the time. When I took it out of the bucket it welded itself to my hand, and I had a time getting it off in any kind of loaf shape, but I eventually succeeded. To say it was sticky would have been and understatement.

I let the second rise go a little long too, but luckily the loaf didn’t fall or develop any crazy big holes.

I didn’t really pay attention to the end of the recipe because once a recipe says “put in the oven…” I usually go on autopilot. So I didn’t see the note about hard vs. soft crusts, but when I read it later it made sense. When the loaf had baked its requisite time I tapped on it while still in the oven and heard a satisfying, hard crusted “knock”. Then I took it out of the oven, placed it on a cooling rack, and a couple hours later went to check on it, only to find my hard crust had become very soft. Apparently this has to do with the moisture escaping slowly through the crust while cooling, which happens when cooling at room temperature but not in a turned-off but warm oven. In the end it was fine, though, because this bread was for sandwiches, and sandwiches are always a little easier to eat with softer crusts. The bread itself has a good flavor, though not like a bread with a true starter, and a good tight crumb which makes it very easy to slice and helps it hold up great on sandwiches.

Country Loaf (adapted from King Arthur’s Country Loaf)

Ingredients

• 1 1/4 cups lukewarm water, minus 2 tablespoons
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 1/2 teaspoons instant yeast
• 1/2 cup Organic 12-grain Flour Blend, or whole wheat flour
• 2 1/2 cups European Style Artisan Bread Flour
• 1 1/2 teaspoon salt

Directions

1. Pour the water into a mixing bowl. Add the yeast and 12 grain or whole wheat flour, and let sit for several minutes until the mixture begins to bubble.
2. Stir in 1 cup of bread flour and the salt and mix well. Gradually add the remaining cup and a half of flour until the dough begins to pull away from the sides of the bowl.
3. Knead – by hand, mixer or bread machine – for 4 to 5 minutes. Let the dough rest while you clean out and grease your bowl; then knead the dough a few more minutes. The dough should be on the slack side and a little tacky, but should not be sticky.
4. When the dough is well-kneaded, place it into the prepared bowl, cover and let rise until doubled in size, 1 1/2 to 2 hours.
5. Shape the dough into a round ball and place on a parchment lined baking sheet. Cover and let rise a second time for 45 minutes to 1 hour. Toward the end of the rising time preheat the oven to 425ºF.
6. Bake the bread for 20 to 25 minutes. For a crisper crust let the bread cool inside the turned off oven with the door cracked; for a soft crust remove from the oven and cool completely on a rack.