First food from the oven

[shuboyje]

Today was a great day, we finally got to fire up the oven and do some cooking. It wasn't without it's ups and downs due to the learning curve, but all in all went well. We started with pizzas, then I baked a few baby loaves of Ciabatta, and as we speak there is still a roast in there slowly cooking to perfection. Attached is the best looking pie of the day, it was cooked in about 60 seconds by my wife. Also there is a picture of my bread, which I was thrilled with, the spring and crust are just amazing, everything I hoped for.

[james]

Re: First food from the oven

Shuboyje,

Welcome to the club! :-) It just gets better from here.
James

[texassourdough]

Re: First food from the oven

Looks like you are off to a good start! Enjoy!
Jay

[DrakeRemoray]

Re: First food from the oven

Congratulations! Looks great!
Drake

[Dino_Pizza]

Re: First food from the oven

Wow, no kidding about your "spring" on your Ciabatta! You can just see it. Did you spray and water in the oven before you put the loaf in to create steam or did it just expand nicely on its own?
Great job & welcome to the cooking club!, Dino

[shuboyje]

Re: First food from the oven

I sprayed the heck out of it...my goal was to follow the instructions in the ebook, but I may have went a bit overboard, lol.

[splatgirl]

Re: First food from the oven

Looks like you're off to a fantastic start!

I've been grooving on the ciabatta the last couple of days, too. There is a "glop" recipe over at the fresh loaf website that produces the most amazing results I've ever gotten with ciabatta with just about zero effort. I'm on batch #3 and can't get enough.

[DrakeRemoray]

Re: First food from the oven

Is this the recipe Splat?
Jason's Quick Coccodrillo Ciabatta Bread | The Fresh Loaf
It looks excellent.

[splatgirl]

Re: First food from the oven

yep, that's it. It ROCKS. Quite possibly the easiest, best bread ever. I'm a really tough critic when it comes to bread, and that recipe makes better ciabatta than any I've ever eaten much less baked myself.
I have to get some semolina flour and try it with that.

[shuboyje]

Re: First food from the oven

I'll have to give that recipe a try. Have you made any adjustments for baking in a brick oven time and temp wise?

[splatgirl]

Re: First food from the oven

I've only tried it once in the WFO, and by the time I got it in there my temp was about 425-450 which I don't think was hot enough. However, the other variable on that attempt is that I was trying to do a sourdough version using my own culture vs. using yeast so that might have had something to do with my issues. Basically, not much oven spring and not good color. I think it was a combination of both factors:


If anything, I would err on the side of too hot an oven and then go by internal temp for baking time. You can always pull it forward into the landing a bit if the crust gets too dark before the interior is done.
And fyi, I have never had to steam the oven to get good spring. Here's my most recent indoor oven batch, with the wfo stuff in the back for comparison.

and the crumb:


The back right loaf is my very first WFO sourdough. Actually my very first loaf of sourdough EVER, and using the culture I grew myself. That loaf was baked with an active fire and way too hot a temp but it took it fairly well. I definitely need more practice and experience. Right now, I can see that the biggest challenge is likely to be coordinating oven temp and dough rise...