Cranberry Nut Bread (No Knead & Overnight Rise)
Soft no knead cranberry nut bread. The recipe includes just a few ‘folds’ rather than kneading and a slow, overnight rise gives this bread excellent flavor. Made in a loaf pan for easy slicing and sandwiching.
Servings 1 loaf
Ingredients
- 350g cool tap water
- ¼ teaspoon active dry yeast
- 2 TB maple syrup optional, to slightly sweeten the bread
- 430g bread flour
- 1 ½ teaspoon fine sea salt
- 65g or about ½ cup walnuts or pecans pre-toasted
- 60g or about ⅓ cup dried cranberries
Instructions
The night before, (I usually start around 7pm: doing a turn at 8pm and another at 9pm)
- Measure the water into a large bowl and sprinkle the yeast over it. Gently stir to combine.
- Measure the bread flour into the bowl and add the salt. Stir to combine until you have a shaggy dough. Cover with plastic wrap and set aside for 45-60 minutes.
- We’re going to do some folds on the dough: lift one side of the dough and fold it over the center. Turn the bowl 45 degrees and lift from another side and fold again. Keep doing this until the dough starts resisting and you have a tight dough ball. Sprinkle the nuts and berries over the dough and cover with the plastic wrap and set aside for 60 minutes.
- After an hour do another fold, this time lifting the dough and folding while incorporating the add-ins; keep going until the dough starts resisting again and the nuts and berries are mostly neatly tucked into the center of the dough (it’s ok if there are some stragglers). Cover the bowl and leave to rise for 8-10 hours.
The morning of baking
- In the morning the dough will have risen quite a bit and be very bubbly. Butter a 9x5 inch loaf pan and then rub it with olive oil (both butter and oil are necessary so the dough doesn’t stick).
- Like you did the night before, fold the dough over itself (it will deflate - this is ok), until you have a taut dough. Tuck the sides in to make a rectangular shape and set it into the prepared loaf pan and rub the top with oil. Cover with the same plastic wrap. Leave to rise until the dough has risen over the rim of the pan by at least half an inch, this can take up to an hour or an hour and a half depending on the temperature in your kitchen.
- Preheat the oven to 425 F. Once preheated, fill a cake pan (any size - I use a round 9 inch) with ice and set it in the oven. After 5-10 minutes of the ice being in the oven, bake the bread until it has risen considerably and is a deep brown color all over - about 30-35 minutes.
- Transfer the bread to a cooling rack. It’s best to give the bread time to cool out of the oven before slicing it for at least an hour as it continues to ‘cook’ out of the oven and the crumb will be nice and tender.