NYT Bread in bread pan, in cold oven.

KipperCat on 10 Jun 2007 at 17:57
I've read a few references to baking the NYT no knead bread in bread tins, and also to starting the bake from a cold oven.  Would the rather enclosed shape of a traditional loaf pan work this way?  I'd love to save some hot oven time, and a more sandwich friendly shape would be welcome at times.
to put a "No Knead" dough in ordinary tins and bake from cold. I do this all the time now when on my boat (can't justify heating an oven in advance on calor gas!!) I use ordinary loaf tins, slash the top  once length wise, deeply, with a bread knife when it is risen above the edges of the tins (about double) and put into unheated oven.. The spring is amazing!  Also, a very good  crust can be made by putting a tin of warm water in the bottom of the oven when the bread goes in - about a half pint of cold water, which turns to steam as the oven warms up. Though I've by and large stopped bothering with this.I also have a large, oval loose bottom tin which holds 1.5 kilo of dough and again, I use this with a no knead dough into an unheated oven. A word of warning - don't let it over proof, as the gently heating oven can make it rise spectacularly and go over the edges!!!!

That's great news.  I think that for a sandwich loaf, I'd prefer a softer crust, so will probably skip the water.  I'll try this with my next loaf.  Another advantage to baking in a loaf  tin would be the room to bake more than one loaf at a time. At some point I've got to stop baking nearly every day & pay more attention to other things!  I suspect that seeing the electric bill for the past month will be a great reminder .

ps  I'll be sure to grease the top edges of the tin, just in case! 

can resullt from the loose bottomed tin! It came apart on me when I was taking it out of the oven and gave me a most bizarre scar - shaped like a lightning bolt - VERY Harry Potter!! I'd photograh my arm (yes, not on the forehead - what would THAT be doing in the oven??!!)  but I don't know how to post pics here!Why not bake a few loaves at a time in tins and freeze them? I'm told freezers work very well...
Andrew

But Andrew, you didn't tell us the most important thing. Did the bread survive, and how was it? <g,d & r>

Seriously, I hope your burn heals quickly.

I used to have cross-hatch scars on my arms. Every summer as I started to tan, the scars stayed white. I was very glad when they finally faded!

The cold oven sounds great right now. What temerature do you bake at? Still 450 degrees? I've been making this bread since November 06 and really like it.

 

This is my first time on this site. Sounds interesting. I loved the posts "you know your a bread baker when......" I related to most of them, I hadn't realized what a fanatic I was. Thanks!

Gary, that's what I did.  I let the loaf do its final proof in the dutch oven, already in the baking oven.  When I was ready to bake it, I just added the lid and turned on the oven.  It made a very easy bread even easier.  I probably greased the dutch oven well beforehand, something I didn't do normally.
Thanks KipperCat. I'm trying it in a loaf pan today. It has about 45 minutes before going to the oven. It is rising nicely in the pan. Hopefully it will turn out okay. I'm going to set another dough tonight and bake in the dutch oven tomorrow. I'll let you know how they come out. I have two starters that I rarely use since Lahey put this recipe out. Thanks again. It's great to converse with other bread people.
I'll look forward to hearing your results. I love this site!  Btw, many people use their starters for no knead bread.  I plan to try that myself soon.