Sunday brunch

Matt and I were lucky enough to get a mushroom-growing kit for Christmas last year (thanks, mom and dad!).  We've been anxiously awaiting our first crop of mushrooms, and on Sunday we decided to do mushroomy brunch in celebration.  Matt baked some no-knead bread to go along -- heaven!

Matt's No-Knead Bread:

3 cups unbleached flour (loose, not packed)
1/4 teaspoon yeast
1 teaspoon salt
1.5 cups warm water

Thoroughly mix the dry ingredients in a bowl -- preferably a bread bowl or dutch oven. Warm the water for about 40 sec in the microwave (you want it to be pretty warm but not burning hot to the touch).  Add the warm water, all at once. Mix with a wooden spoon. Eventually you'll get an evenly consistent, super wet dough. Once the dough is evenly mixed, cover with saran wrap (or lid) and let sit for 12-24 hours. Dough should double or triple in size and be covered in bubbles. Lightly flour a cutting board (not waxed paper! We learned this the hard way), and gently scrape the dough onto it. It will be stuck to the sides of the bowl, so you'll have to scoop it out with your fingers. Get it out in one piece, and try to squish it down as little as possible in the process. Grab one edge at a time and quickly pull out then fold over on to itself. Do this 4 times (12 o'clock, 3 o'clock, 6 o'clock, 9 o'clock). Again, don't punch down the dough. Loosely cover with saran wrap and let sit 1-2 hours on the counter. 

Preheat oven to 450F with dutch oven inside, lid off for faster heating. Once preheated, go another 15-20 minutes to make sure dutch oven is evenly heated. I normally just wait 30 minutes from the time I turn on the oven. Remove dutch oven. Scrape dough off board into dutch oven, don't try to pick it up. It doesn't matter if it doesn't land right in the center, looks ugly, etc. Immediately put lid on dutch oven, then transfer back to 450F oven. Cook for 35 minutes. Remove lid. Cook another 5-10 until nicely browned. I've been going until some of the little cracked bits are just starting to burn. Remove from oven, and dump bread onto cutting board or cooling rack. It should fall right out. Cool 30 minutes before cutting.  Devour with butter and/or honey.