Easy Garlic Cheese No-Knead Bread Recipe (2024)

FAQs

Why is my homemade no-knead bread so dense? ›

Why is my bread dense: Usually bread will be too dense when there is too much flour. Keep in mind this dough will be pretty sticky, do not add more flour than specified. Other factors that come into play are humidity and age of flour. Little yeast, long rise, sticky dough are keys to a good, light loaf.

Vinegar – I use my homemade apple cider vinegar but any vinegar will do, it helps create a better texture in no-knead bread recipes.

The main difference is in the way that gluten is formed in the loaves. Kneaded breads use kneading to develop the gluten and no-knead breads use the natural chemical changes that happen when flour and water are mixed to develop the gluten.

It slows yeast activity, giving enzymes time to break down starches that contribute sweet notes to the bread's flavor and improve browning.

Add Sugar

Adding sugar weakens the gluten structure, absorbs water, and eventually makes the bread lighter and softer. As a result, sugar improves the bread's taste, structure and texture. Yeast also eats up sugar to produce carbon dioxide, which raises the dough and makes bread fluffy.

This structure allows for trapping of gases so the bread will rise up nice and high. And gluten is what makes bread deliciously chewy. If you don't knead your dough, your baked bread won't rise as high, and the overall texture and appearance will be dense.

Wetting the dough causes the surface to steam. Covering it traps the moisture. This partnership stops the bread from drying out on the surface in the hot air of the oven and forming a premature crust. Your bread rises more and produces a richer colour, becoming glossy on the surface.

When just vinegar and yeast are mixed, vinegar's weak acid cancels out yeast's ability to grow.

If the dough isn't mixed or kneaded to full development (e.g., full windowpane), adding in sets of stretch and folds during bulk fermentation will help continue its progress toward a firmer, more cohesive dough that's able to trap gas and hold its shape all the way to bake time.

What happens if you put too much yeast in bread? ›

Too much yeast could cause the dough to go flat by releasing gas before the flour is ready to expand. If you let the dough rise too long, it will start having a yeast or beer smell and taste and ultimately deflate or rise poorly in the oven and have a light crust.

No-knead (Passive): In this mix-to-combine, long-fermented method, time is used to maximum effect for developing both flavor and strength. Pros: Dough develops flavor during extended fermentation. Easy. Cons: Uncontrolled fermentation may cause variable impacts to crumb structure and flavor.

No-knead bread gets its power from a long, slow rise at room temperature. Mix up the dough in the morning and let it sit for at least six hours before shaping and rising for one hour more. The bread bakes for 30 minutes covered and 15 minutes uncovered in the Dutch oven.

The method uses a long rise instead of kneading to align the dough's gluten molecules with each other so as to produce a strong, elastic network, resulting in long, sticky strands.

Too much extra flour worked into the dough while folding and/or shaping can cause dense bread. Over mixing can cause a dense loaf by the weakening and breakdown of the gluten (not likely to happen if you fold dough or hand knead). The flour you used is a whole grain with coarse bits of bran and grain in it.

Getting the amount of flour right is vital due to the high flour ratio to the other bread ingredients. Measuring one or two tablespoons too much per cup (easy to do) can cause your bread to be dense.