Back in Business & Baking Bread!

[eileen]

Re: Back in Business & Baking Bread!

Thanks for the quick reply. I have a forno bravo artigiano and it was installed just as Forno Bravo suggests. I'm not handy so I didn't do it myself. I guess what happens is that I don't get the oven temp up high enough to begin with. I had sort of forgotten about the white dome bit since I haven't baked since fall. I am just always afraid I will lose my heat so I rush. I guess what you are telling me is that it could take 2 hours to heat up the oven to 800 degrees or so then take out the wood embers that are left and give it some time to settle down. If it gets up that high it will last awhile. But what worries me is that as the embers burn to ash, doesn't the oven cool down alot ? And how do you get the oven up that high if you are letting those embers burn down? eileen

[Dutchoven]

Re: Back in Business & Baking Bread!

Eileen
Don't worry...fire the oven with a very big fire...the dome will get clean...then the embers which are about 1000 degrees will continue to soak heat into the bricks and when they turn to a layer of ash they actually insulate the floor somewhat. When you remove the ash the floor and dome will stabilize shortly at about 600 degrees. You should get a good 6 hours of baking temperatures...sometimes more...don't be afraid...let those red embers soak their heat into the floor...then it will give it bake to you in spades
Best
Dutch

I guess what you are telling me is that it could take 2 hours to heat up the oven to 800 degrees or so then take out the wood embers that are left and give it some time to settle down. If it gets up that high it will last awhile. But what worries me is that as the embers burn to ash, doesn't the oven cool down alot ? And how do you get the oven up that high if you are letting those embers burn down? eileen

[DrakeRemoray]

Re: Back in Business & Baking Bread!

Could be a silly question, but do you have a door?

Drake

[james]

Re: Back in Business & Baking Bread!

Hi Eileen,

I can add a few things. Heck, I also have an Artigiano.

Don't be afraid to build a serious fire and get the entire dome white/clear, and then keep the fire going for another 30 minutes. That is how you basically "fill" the mass of the bricks with the heat you will use for retained heat cooking. One great way of doing that is to throw a pizza party (or bake a lot of pizza for the family). First, get the dome clear with a really big fire; then push the fire to the side, but keep adding wood every 15 minutes or so, while you are baking pizza. You want to tip of the fire reaching beyond the halfway point of the dome.

The pizzas will be ready in about 2 minutes, and you will be adding more heat to the oven.

Then, rake the hot coals over the floor and close the door. Let the oven rest for 15-20 minutes or so, and rake out the coals. The oven will gently fall from 600?F+ down through 350?F -- where you can roast and bake.

The more fire you add to the oven, the more heat you can use to bake.

You have lots of fun in store.

One other thing, we just produced a CD ROM with all of our cooking eBooks -- bread, pizza and cooking. If you send your address and phone # to info@fornobravo.com, we will send you one of the first copies. It has lots of photos and graphics that go into more detail on al of this.
James

[gjbingham]

Re: Back in Business & Baking Bread!

If you're not using some type of Infrared thermometer, you must get one. Once you clean out the coals, you will probably be between 600 - 700 degrees. Close off the oven with a door, check the temp every 5 - 10 minutes and keep track of how fast it cools.

After a couple of firings, you will get comfortable with how fast your oven gets to bread temps, or other cooking temps you desire. I do a lot of ciabbata, pain a l'Ancienne and mediocre sourdough. I throw the most of the loaves in at 600 degrees. The oven is about 475 when they are done. 430 for sourdough.

Play with it and learn how your oven behaves. Then enjoy!

[Frances]

Re: Back in Business & Baking Bread!

Hey guys, I didn't know you could bake bread that hot... why the lower temps for sourdough George? Or is that just because you do it last?

[Dutchoven]

Re: Back in Business & Baking Bread!

We do sometimes...depends on the formula...and how brave you are...I remember CJim saying he had popped some baguettes in one time when his floor was like 625 ...in 8 minutes he had beauties!
My grandfather used to say "It's all in the way you hold your tongue."
Sourdough at that temp is probably quite crusty, longer lower drier bake makes for more crust. I think I will have to give it a try sometime.
Remember to let the oven rest in between loads...it will recover a good bit of baking heat...longer rest as times wears on....those bricks store a lot of heat
Best
Dutch

Hey guys, I didn't know you could bake bread that hot... why the lower temps for sourdough George? Or is that just because you do it last?

[gjbingham]

Re: Back in Business & Baking Bread!

I mostly let it cool down a bit more for sourdough because I'm using Reinhart's recipe which calls for 500 degrees and then turning it down to 425. The bake time is 20 plus minutes. Mine are going more than 30 minutes to get the bread to 205 degrees.

[james]

Re: Back in Business & Baking Bread!

You can bake hotter in a WFO than you can in a conventional oven without burning. A bread that will go black in an electric oven at 550?F, comes out carmelized brown in a wood-fired oven at 550?F.

Fun, fun.

James

[CanuckJim]

Re: Back in Business & Baking Bread!

George,

The ideal temp I use for sourdough boule is 550 F on the hearth. You really have to get outside the box; that is outside comparing the times and temps listed for home or deck ovens and the times and temps in a WFO. They are completely different things. This is one of the principal themes of the bread workshops I teach. The first is an air temperature reading, while the second is a masonry reading. They are not remotely similar.

The rule of thumb I give my students is that if a recipe written for a home oven says, for example, 500 F for forty minutes to bake a 2 lb. boule, then in a WFO with a hearth temperature of 550 F it will take twenty-two minutes to reach an internal temperature of 205 F. One of the things that these kinds of temps give you in your WFO is beautifully caramelized grain sugars on the crust. Sourdough boule are made using a lean dough, while breads enriched with things like butter and milk should be baked in a WFO at an ideal hearth temperature of between 475 and 500.

So the rule is: in a WFO, bake hotter, bake shorter, cut the home oven recipe bake time in half, then experiment from there.

To illustrate the point, at last weekend's workshop we baked quite large baguette, with very good steam, on a 690 F hearth. They took six minutes to reach 205 internal. For instruction purposes, I left the door off for longer than I normally would before steaming, so they could see that at such high temps the loaves began to brown and rise almost as soon as they hit the brick, much like a pizza. The crust was nicely caramelized and the bottoms of the loaves were white; nothing burned. Simply put, the students were stunned that we pulled it off.

I've read that in Paris baguette are the first bakes of the day, and the hearth temperature is sometimes as high as 750. Haven't tried that yet, but I will.

I prefer my baguette crust to be on the thin side, but to make it thicker and crunchier, I would have vented the steam at the two minute mark, rather than three, and baked them for seven minutes.

Jim

[Frances]

Re: Back in Business & Baking Bread!

This is a question that I should have asked ages ago, but I only just thought of it...

What IS the air temperature in a WFO when the hearth reaches 550?

Because my thermometer pokes through the door and measures the temp about 5 cm above the hearth... Maybe 550 air temp would be a bit too much even for WFO bread?

[james]

Re: Back in Business & Baking Bread!

Temperature, temperature everywhere. Our ovens have different temperatures at different spots in the dome and the floor -- and I have never done a scientific test of the difference between the air temperature and the refractory temperature.

At bread temperature, I always just stick my hand in there and count Mississippis.

Jim, what do you think?

James

[gjbingham]

Re: Back in Business & Baking Bread!

CJim,
Good lesson. Thanks for taking the time to post. Believe me, I throw my sourdough in at about 550 floor temps. As I've said, the floor cools quickly. I go from 650 to 450 in an hour. Its kind of hit and miss. A small window to get all the bread in there at the right time. I'd hoped for better, but regardless, it works. Its just a matter of paying attention and being ready to go when the time comes to put in the bread. I've blackened a few loaves of ciabbatta along the way, so I'm pretty careful not to load the oven till I get to 625 (floor temp) or so. It may just be a matter of giving the oven an extra hour of fire before baking. The extra heat in the bricks might do wonders for my results.
My management techniques are not quite up to par yet either. I've got everything out and proofing, but just two peels to put the bread into the oven with. The boules are pretty large, so its just one per peel. That's after the ciabatta or whatever else I'm baking. I need a couple more peels to make me more efficient. Flouring just the two in between subsequent loadings while messing around with misting the oven really slows me down.
It''s not a huge issue yet anyway. I'm still not that happy with my wild yeast starter. Its still an infant and the sourness is lacking. Funny, it was really nice for the first bake, then faded to insigificant. I recently went back to rye flour for feeding. Perhaps that will help.

[arevalo53anos]

Re: Back in Business & Baking Bread!

GJB:

You could try to feed your starter as a biga, meaning 45% hidratyon or so. More acidity and so far better to bread making.

Luis