Asiago Cheese Bread
This artisan Asiago cheese bread has only six ingredients and requires no strenuous kneading! Mix your ingredients in one bowl, proof, bake it in your Dutch oven, and you’ll have perfect Asiago cheese bread in no time!
Servings: 1 loaf
Equipment
- 1 mixing bowl
- 1 Dutch oven 4 qt size preferred
- 1 cheese grater
Ingredients
- 435 g bread flour, plus more for dusting [3½ cups]
- 7 g instant yeast [2¼ tsp]
- 10 g kosher salt [1 tbsp]
- 12 g white granulated sugar (optional) [1 tbsp]
- 360 ml lukewarm water [1½ cups]
Instructions
- In a large mixing bowl, stir together bread flour, instant yeast, sugar, and salt.435 g bread flour, plus more for dusting, 7 g instant yeast, 10 g kosher salt, 12 g white granulated sugar (optional)
- Pour in warm water and mix with a wooden spoon/silicone spatula until combined and there are no more dry patches of flour. It will be a very wet mixture!360 ml lukewarm water
- Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and put in a warm place to rise and double in volume, around 1½ to 3 hours.
- After dough has doubled in volume, dust your work surface generously with extra flour. Scoop the wet dough onto the floured surface and lightly dust with more flour.
- With floured hands and dough, grab the portion of the dough furthest away from you and stretch it over towards you (or the bottom of the dough). Once you've done that, turn the dough 90º and repeat three more times.
- Form the folded dough into a ball and transfer to the center of a piece of parchment paper larger than the size of your Dutch oven. Cover dough with plastic wrap and let rest for 30 minutes.
- Store your empty Dutch oven inside of the oven as it preheats to 450ºF. After the dough has rested, carefully remove the Dutch oven from the oven and take off the lid.
- Uncover the dough from the plastic wrap. Score the dough down the middle, then use the corners of the parchment paper to transfer the dough into the hot Dutch oven.
- Sprinkle the remaining shredded Asiago cheese on top of the dough, then cover the Dutch oven with the lid. Bake for 25 minutes with the lid, then remove lid and bake for another 5-10 minutes.
- Remove bread from oven and let cool inside the uncovered Dutch oven for 10 minutes before carefully transferring the bread to a cooling rack to cool completely.
Video
Notes
- Don’t peek! The reason why bread develops that irresistible crunchy exterior is because of the steam inside of the oven. Try not to peek at your bread in the first 30 minutes of baking because opening the oven door may allow the steam to escape.
- You’ll definitely need a bit of flour to handle the proofed dough. This bread recipe has a high hydration percentage (which essentially means that it’s a very wet dough, in baker’s terms). Don’t be afraid to use some extra bread flour to help handle the dough when you’re folding and shaping it. No need to mix the flour into the dough, just add a thin dusting on the surface to make it easier to handle.
- Don't knead the dough, fold it. Just like David and Moira Rose say, you have to fold it in. You can see exactly how I fold the dough in the attached video for this Asiago cheese bread recipe.