Bread recipes

BachSoon

I used to make my own bread and want to get back into it.
Has anyone ever made their own bread without salt? If so, how did it go? Any good?

GreenQueen

Did once forget the salt, and it tasted very bland. May be worth experimenting with herbs/garlic to see if they substitute?

BachSoon

I shall give it a try! Thank you

Thrice

Salt isn't just for flavour, it helps to tighten the gluten formed in the dough to give it a better structure, and it stops the yeast from rising too quickly to give a better texture and crumb.

But if you have lots of other ingredients in there, like herbs, olives etc, you could get away with not having it there x

Callie22

In Tuscany they make bread with no salt - it's called Pane Toscano or Pane Sciocco (stupid bread ) It's not unpleasant but it takes a bit of getting used to. One of the theories about why this kind of bread is made is that allegedly the local water is so mineral rich that you don't need to add salt, the other is that it was developed to avoid paying salt taxes. Generally you find that the bread is eaten with really salty foods anyway, like cured meats and aged cheeses. There are lots of recipes online and it's worth a try, but if you're leaving salt out you do need to make sure that you're using decent ingredients to compensate. You need decent flour and don't use water straight from the tap. Most recipes also use a ferment to add flavour so it's a little more complicated than a basic bread recipe.

suki1964

Seriously I wouldn't worry about the teaspoon or two of salt in a loaf of bread, its a hell of a lot less then in a shop bought loaf and unless you intend in eating the loaf yourself, in one sitting or day, the amount is ineligible

BachSoon

Thanks everyone. It seems I will be better leaving it in!

Laura_Elsewhere

BachSoon wrote: »

Thanks everyone. It seems I will be better leaving it in!

One useful way to halve the quantity of salt you use in bread-making is to use Dove's Farm dried yeast - I don't know any technicalities but it seems to differ in a couple of ways from all the other dried yeast in the supermarket. For one thing, it's typically hidden in the 'Free From' aisle as it has no gluten actually in it - I don't understand why the other yeasts would have gluten in them, but there you go...
but the useful thing for us is that the quantity the packet says to use for an 800g/ 2lb loaf are HALF the salt needed by the other brands of dried yeast.

So if you want to halve your salt intake in homemade bread, use Dove's Farm yeast and use half the amount of salt!

We use something like 5g salt in an 800g loaf...