The Bread of the Season

So you want to be a domestic goddess--or at least you want to not hang your head in shame when you bring dinner to a friend.

In my last ward there was some trepidation in bringing meals. You were, after all, bringing dinner the day after the culinary school graduate brought dinner, and you wanted to be a domestic goddess. Or at least have your friend eat the meal.

And so it is with some hesitation that I reveal a great secret. Making a decent bakery-style boule is so easy Jonathan could do most of it. It is Mark Bittman's No-Knead Bread, which you may have heard about.

You pull out a bowl, stir some flour, yeast, salt, and water together. And then you forget about it for 12-18 hours. You dump it out, let it rest, form it into a ball and then wait two more hours. Then for the part Jonathan couldn't do: you heat up a huge dutch oven (cast iron or ceramic or glass) in a fiery hot oven, toss the bread in there and voila.

Okay, it isn't bread like an artisan makes with years of training, but it costs a quarter and takes hardly any effort.

So if truth be told, if you want to be thought a domestic goddess when bringing a meal, your only hope is that the culinary school graduate doesn't own a cast iron pot, and you do.