At long last bread ( a long post)

Although I baked the NoKnead bread recipe immediately after it appeared in the Times I soon left it behind in favor of kneaded breads and other baking adventures. When Judy offered me this chance though I happily volunteered. I was in the 2nd wave of pots and had various family and work stuff that slowed me down but I finally post.

Even before I received my pot I did some practice rounds. It had been a while. (Did I remember how "shaggy" the dough really was?) My first try was with some French SAS yeast that was still good by date but clearly had lost it's lift. I don't have a photo of that mess.

New yeast . I used an old Copco enameled pot that I thought I had used previously. I got a pretty bread with a perfect crust . Not as "holey" an interior as I would love but yummy.

Richard then delivered this beauty to me. Oh my goodness, just lovely. Seeing pictures in previous posts I was thinking a lot about handles and lids but these looked beautiful and functional. Hooray.My only concern was that it looked small.

I baked a loaf. I followed the original NYT recipe with 1/4 t yeast because I used all white flour in these test bakings. The loaf looked good, but seemed to not be browning well. I took it out after 55 min total and it was just not quite done enough and had not risen as high as I had hoped . The very center was a little mushy but I didn't think I could have baked it longer.
It came out of the pan easily.

I baked a second loaf and it had a beautiful crust. It was also not as round and high as I hoped

and it too had a mushy core, not really raw but different than the crumb surrounding. I don't think it was undertimed and I got to thinking about volume.

The original NYT article says to put the loaf in a 6-8qt casserole/cast iron pot. Other articles said that the size didn't matter too much but when I measured out my beauty it only held 2 qts.

That makes it only 25% or 33% of the ideal. I am thinking that the air space around the covered loaf must have some effect on the outcome.

I spoke with Judy and decided to try a side by side from one double recipe to limit the variables.

I used a big red cast iron that hold 7 quarts and my Judypot. (which I think looks like a bird,maybe Breadbirds for a name.

I switched oven position during both the covered and uncovered bakings.

My bread from the larger pot clearly was bigger . My little pot still had that tiny soft core. I think the energy that is expanded while covered in the space must be turned inward in the little pot. This might not be as useful a characteristic in breads as it is people. I will next try the judypot with a 1/2 or 2/3 recipe to give it more space.
I havn't been part of the comments yet but here are some of my thoughts:

I look at too many school supply catalogs to think Motzpots is a worthy name of these bakers.

Something more elegant. I added the BreadBird thought after I wrote this but I still like it.

I was going to link to the hydration article in the NYT but you have done that for me. All this thinking about volume and hydration is liking taking a class.

As much as bakers buying for themselves I see the pots as a lovely gift. In light of my volume problem I would be looking for some consistency in the volume versus the recipe. Bread baking is an art but there is also chemistry and many people may want to bake without a great deal of experimenting.

My white pot has some beautiful signs of use, it is aging well.