Rustic Italian ciabatta

Make the biga: stir water, a very small amount of yeast and bread flour until incorporated, a stiff dough.

Cover the biga and leave it to rise overnight.

Put the biga in a mixing bowl with water at 110 to 115F and break it up by hand.

Add a little instant yeast, the salt and the rest of the flour; mix by hand or with a flexible scraper into a slack dough.

Knead by agitating the dough in the bowl rather than on the counter, with rests, until the arm tires.

Leave about an hour.

Bowl fold: reach to the outside of the bowl and stretch and fold to the middle, working around the dough until it holds together. Clean the sides.

Ferment about another hour, until bubbly and marshmallowy; watch the dough, not the clock.

Push flour down the sides of the bowl, release the dough onto a generously floured surface and ease it into a rectangle; flour the top.

Sift an even, heavy dusting of flour onto the bench; cut the dough into two even pieces and lift each with flat hands onto the floured bench, stretching to a rectangle.

Final proof on the bench, loosely covered so they do not dry out, a little over an hour.

Dust the tops with flour, roll each forward and invert onto a parchment-lined sheet tray.

Slide onto a well preheated baking stone in a hot oven and add water to cast iron pans in the bottom of the oven for steam.

Bake until well coloured with a firm, crisp crust.