cookery · i

a simple bread

one loaf · two days · any season

ingredients

• 500g strong wheat flour
• 10g fine salt
• 3g dried yeast, or a spoon of the previous starter
• 340g cool water
• a clean tea-towel

method

1. mix everything in a wide bowl until no flour is dry; cover, leave at the kitchen table from evening to morning.
2. fold the dough once onto itself, shape into a round, rest seam-down on the floured towel for an hour.
3. bake in the hottest oven you have, lid on a heavy pot for twenty minutes, lid off for twenty more.

the bread will tell you when it is done by the hollow sound; everything else is theatre.

eat at seven, with butter, with a little salt, with whatever the pantry has to offer.