4 C strong white or wholemeal flour
1 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon instant fast-acting yeast
2 C warm water
Place all ingredients in a large bowl. Keep yeast and salt well-separated from each other til you're ready to work. Mix all of the dry well. Form a well in the middle of the dry. Pour about 1 1/2 C of water into the well. Mix from the middle taking a little more of the dry with each pass. Now mix vigorously until all of the flour is absorbed (add more water as needed).
Note: I make this as dry as possible to make the kneading easier. While fermenting, the mix will soften and become gooey. Drier you start less gooey the final dough. Wholemeal flour might need more water than white flour.
Once flour is absorbed, cover with a damp towel or cling film and place in a draft-free place. Let this ferment for 5 hours. What's going to happen is time substitutes for kneading. Gluten will form and mature over the five hours.
Preheat the oven to 200 C. Scrape dough out of the bowl onto well-floured surface. At first, knead with a bench scraper or well-floured hands, until the dough is workable. Then knead as usual with your hands 5-7 minutes. Form into a loaf. Place on a silicone paper lined sheet pan. Cover with damp towel or cling film and let rise about an hour. Slash loaf down the middle or diagonally. Bake for 40 minutes. Test for done. Leave to cool on a wire rack.
