No Knead Air Fryer Cider Bread

My love affair with this recipe started about a year ago and it has developed into a steady, committed relationship of previously unknown depths. It is quick, low energy (both for you and your bills) and clean, only using one bowl and a spatula (and a bowl to weigh out the flour, but I reuse that to weigh out the dogs’ rice, so choose not to count it).

This was originally a Dutch Oven recipe, which always produced crusty, fabulous loaves, but also mean my oven was on at 240°C for 1½ hours and recently I decided… not to do that. So, we were missing out on lovely homemade bread.

Fortunately, I gave into the craze and got myself an air fryer, became dutifully obsessed and one day, while extoling the virtues of this heavenly contraption, I decided to test its limits with this bread. Sorting out the timings was a bit hit and miss, but this recipe is nothing if not forgiving and I quickly hit on this winning recipe for success.

The recipe itself is very simple: yeast, sugar, water, cider, flour and salt. If you stick to the ratios and methodology, it is an extremely flexible recipe, so you can adapt it to your taste. My family likes brown bread, so I personally split my flour between strong white and wholemeal bread flours and that works very well, although it does produce a denser loaf than when I use just strong white bread flour. You can add any herbs and spices you feel like to make it your own.

Cider adds a fantastic flavour to the bread, making it ever so slightly sweeter and much more interesting. So far I’ve stuck with the classics, but I wonder what would happen if you used Mixed Berries Frapple…

Recipe

• 200ml Courtney’s Cider
• 100ml hot water
• 11g dry active yeast (1½ packets)
• 1tsp sugar
• 400g bread flour
• 1 large pinch salt 

1. Mix the dry active yeast and sugar together in a large bowl.
2. Pour over the Courtney’s Cider and hot water and wait for the yeast to activate.
3. Mix together the flour and salt. If the salt comes into direct contact with the yeast, it will kill the yeast and your bread won’t rise.
4. When the yeast has frothed (about 5-10 minutes, but wait for longer if it’s cold) tip your flour and salt mixture into the liquid and mix with a spatula until the ingredients are combined and no flour is visible on the surface of the dough.
5. Cover and leave in a warm place to proof. If it’s warm, the dough should double in size in an hour, but if it’s cold either wait it out, or take the opportunity to turn a radiator on for an hour with double the purpose.
6. When the dough has doubled in size, take the spatula and fold the edges into the middle of the dough, moving in a circular motion, until the dough is retaining its shape.
7. Recover and leave to proof for 40 minutes.
8. Preheat the air fryer to 205°C.
9. When the air fryer is heated, place a piece of baking paper on the bottom of the basket and easy the dough onto the paper using a spatula. The dough is loose and will not hold its shape. Try not to lose any air bubbles during the transfer.
10. Set the air fryer to 25 minutes and walk away.
11. Check and either take it out, or add another 2 minutes, if you feel the bread isn’t quite baked.
12. Let the bread cool before serving, or it will crumble.

Serving Suggestions

Add garlic powder to your flour mix and make a garlic butter to dip the bread into. From experience, this will make any dinner party guest ask for the recipe at the first bite. Serve with Whimple Orchards Cider.

https://courtneys.online/cider/whimple-orchards/