This uses a method where relatively moist dough is stored for five days in the refrigirator, and then baked in a hot oven, giving it a final rise by “oven-spring”. The whole wheat flavour combines very well with the ginger. And I love the rustic crust with buckwheat.

While “Artisan bread in 5 minutes” sounds like they just want to sell you the book, the gist of the method made a lot of sense to me, as it uses relatively moist dough, a long gentle rising time and a good hot oven. They claim that kneading isn’t really neccessary, and with whole wheat it’s even counter-productive – you should not knead, they explain, because the bran will cut the long strands of gluten that trap the gas bubbles when the dough is rising. As I recognized that with my own home-baked whole wheat bread being a tad too dense, I thought I’d give this method a try.

Make the dough

Combine the flour, salt, cranberries, baking ginger, syrup and olive oil in a mixing bowl, using a fork or sturdy whisk. Gently add the lukewarm water and stir till all is absorbed. You’ll now have a rather wet dough. Divide over two plastic lidded containers, that have room for easily four times the amount you put in. Put the lids on but do not close them air-tight – the gas produced by the yeast needs to be able to escape. Leave at room temperature for about two hours to get the yeast working, then put the containers in the fridge – and leave them there for at least five days!

Get ready to bake

Get one containter out of the fridge, and scoop the moist dough out with floured hands. Shape loosely into a ball, then cover it with water using a brush or – just dunk it quickly under a lukewarm running tap. Place it onto a floured work surface or a piece of baking paper. Scatter the buckwheat loosely on top. Using a *very* sharp knife – a razor blade works really well – make some cuts across the top; they should be about 2 cm deep. Leave it to rest for about one hour. Just before putting it into the oven, carefully pour a little bit of water into the cuts on top, just enough to wet the surface again.

Pre-heat the oven to 230°C. Using an oven stone or a cast-iron pizza pan works really well with baking in this way; put it in the middle rack. Place a second baking tray under it that can hold a bit of water. Use an oven thermometer to check that the temperature is right.

This is my ancient and tiny electrical oven, but although it’s cramped, it can get hot enough (even too hot) for bread baking. I went to the local tile shop and bought one unglazed square black marble tile of the standard 20 x 20 cm size, with a thickness of about 1cm. Any stone tile would work, as long as it’s unglazed and has the open, unpolished surface of natural stone. Not sure how this translates into English, but the Dutch speak of “sweetened stone” for this kind of tile. in A very inexpensive solution, this fits the tiny space like it’s made for it, and works perfectly to spread and hold the heat.

When the oven is hot enough, use a wide metal spatula or bamboo pizza scoop to place the dough onto the stone. Fill a second sturdy baking tray with half a centimeter of water: this will provide extra steam to prolong the time that the rising dough can expand, which will give you a wonderful thin crust and airy crumb.

As it’s a small loaf, bake for 15 minutes, or till the crust looks nice and browned and the bread should sound hollow when tapped.

Results

As is clear by the photo I made of it, the loaf did its “oven-spring” quite happily, almost like it was a very large piece of popcorn. To my happy surprise, a piece of ginger had risen up out of the depths, to surface in the middle of the cross. I’m quite pleased with the resulting crumb as well. The whole wheat crumb isn’t dry, has a nice full-flavoured, sweet gingery taste, and I love the crust. I think this method of a 5-day wait in the refrigirator, and then the no-hassle shape-and-bake works really well, and I’ll be trying it out with other bread baking recipes as well.

^After getting it out of the oven, I discovered a piece of ginger that had turned up in the middle of the cross, looking like a gold coin