Recipe No Knead Beer Bread

This is the easiest bread I make. Requires the sacrifice of a beer.. the darker the better I think.

You needs:
4.5 cups flour
1.5 teaspoons yeast
1.5 teaspoons salt
1/2 cup warm water
1 beer - I usually use Shiner Black Lager or Guinness Black Lager. If you use Coors you might as well just throw in water.
cornmeal and flour for dusting

Pour warm water (105-110F) into a bowl. Sprinkle yeast on top. Add 1/4 cup of flour and mix with a wooden spoon until it gets smooth. Cover and set in warm spot for half an hour.

Add the beer (I let mine sit out to get it to room temp), remaining flour, and salt. Mix until all the flour is in and you've got a thick, sticky dough that pulls away from the sides of your bowl. Cover with a warm, wet towel and set in a warm spot for about 2 hours or until double in size.

Scrape the dough from the bowl and place on well floured surface. Sprinkle flour on top of the dough, and form it into a loaf shape. You can also divide it half and make two loafs.

Sprinkle cornmeal on a baking pan, enough to evenly cover the bottom, then transfer the loaf to the pan. The cornmeal will keep it from sticking to the pan, and will help give the bottom a nice crunch. Cover loosely with a towel (a dry one this time) and let it rise another half hour to 45 minutes. After time is up, take a very sharp knife and with the tip, score the top of each loaf lengthwise a little to let it expand as it bakes.

Get your oven to 425 and put a small pan of water on the bottom rack. Set the next rack directly above that, and put your bread there. Bake for 35 minutes until it develops a nice brown color.

Cool it on a rack when it's done. I take one of the fully cooled loaves and wrap it in saran wrap, then aluminum foil, and freeze it. They do great frozen.