What Richard Flanagan Taught Me About Baking Bread

I’m reading Richard Flanagan’s And What Do You Do, Mr Gable? at the moment* and in it there’s a short essay called ‘Bread’ which was originally published in The Age. He talks about his memories of bread baking, dating back to when he was a child. At the end also is a recipe called ‘The Flanatta’ – like a ciabatta – and is, like he says, simple and needs no kneading. This recipe is what I followed.

It’s not something you can knock up quickly because using cold water instead of warm slows the proving time. I left mine to rise for almost 24 hours. It’s a nice 4-Ingredient recipe too (plain flour, cold water, salt, yeast).

And by God it was worth it.

I knew we were on a winner when I cut off a slice after it had cooled down to take to Adam to taste. Normally he does so with a due sense of caution – remember, my experiments have not all been successful – but this time, within seconds, his eyes widened with surprise.

“This is amazing.”

I ate mine in my favourite way to eat fresh bread: with a good scraping of butter and some honey on top.

I didn’t need any fancy equipment either, just a really really really hot oven, a casserole pot with a lid, and about twenty seconds arm work to bring the dough together.

Terrific.

*I’ll write more on what I’m reading at the moment next week.

This is week seventeen of the 1 recipe a week for a year ‘living list’ challenge. (17/52)

Tagged as: living list, one recipe a week