I always thought bread was hard to make. I was wrong. With a little planning ahead, your kitchen can smell like homemade bread with very, very little effort. I adapted this no-knead ciabatta from a recipe I found on a cooking blog.

Honestly, this bread is so easy to make I almost feel bad when receiving compliments for making guests bread from scratch, almost…

CIABATTA.jpgIngredients

1 cup whole wheat flour
3 cups bread flour
1/4 teaspoon yeast
2 cups war water
1 Tbsb olive oil
2 Tbsb corn meal

Directions

Combine and mix all dry ingredients together (except for cornmeal). Add water and olive oil and stir until you have a very stick ball of dough. Cover the bowl loosely with a just-barely-damp towel and let the dough sit at room temperature for 16-18 hours.

Dough should be very wet, sticky and full of air bubbles. Knead this ball of dough a couple times, just a few folds in the bowl, so it becomes more compact. Cover a surface with flour and carefully stretch the dough out into a rectangle that will fit onto your baking sheet (if you need to add a bit of flour to make the dough easier to handle, that’s fine!)

Prep baking sheet by drizzing olive oil across the surface (you can also brush it on). Sprinkle the corn meal across the surface so that it is evenly coated. Transfer the dough rectangle–it doesn’t have to be pretty–to the baking sheet and let it sit for 2 hours.

Preheat the oven to 425 and bake the bread for 25 minutes or until the crust is golden brown. The bread is great for sandwiches–think Labor Day burger bun–or just straight out of the oven with some olive oil and vinegar.

P.S. The blog Budget Bytes has a slightly different version with step by step instructions and photos you might find helpful here.

The Food Safety News crew is taking a day off from writing about food to take time to simply enjoy it.  In keeping with our holiday tradition, we’re sharing some of our recipes in another virtual potluck: from Suz’s cabbage salsa to Cookson’s squash salad, from Dan’s pasta to Andy’s prawns, from Helena’s ciabatta to Gretchen’s cookie bars. Have a restful Labor Day.