The Fresh Loaf

A Community of Amateur Bakers and Artisan Bread Enthusiasts.

Same-day Bake + Steam Challenge

Elsiebake's picture
Elsiebake

Same-day Bake + Steam Challenge

I'm new to this site and I've been enjoying browsing through everyone's recipes and discussions. After a few years of hiatus, I've just gotten myself back to baking sourdough breads, and I finally got a healthy starter going again after more than 2 months. (of course kicking myself for getting rid of my old starter after realizing how hard it is to get it started!) I am just coming out of the frustrating period of producing hockey pucks with the immature starter paired with an inpatient owner/baker. 

Now that this part of the sourdough challenge is over, I'm facing another - creating sufficient enough steam without a cover. I have an awesome cast iron flat griddle that I bought from an antique store many years ago, and I love it. But because of its narrow oblong shape, none of my regular metal or glass bowls fit over. I know that I should just invest in a nice big cast iron dutch oven, but I'm just hesitating to buy more single-purpose items to clutter the kitchen. 

Because I'm renting, I cannot make any alterations to my oven, so drilling holes on the side is not an option. And I've just been experimenting with different methods.

Today, I decided to whip up and bake a loaf on a same day. I know that the flavor and the oven spring would be much better after a cold ferment in the fridge, but I was just inpatient. The steaming methods I used today was a combination of steaming towel at the bottom of the oven, plus a few large ice cubes placed in a colander at the top of the oven. The slowly melting ice cubes create a slow trickle of water hitting the bottom of the oven immediately creating steam for good 10 minutes. 

Of course, I should've tried this without the towel... but again, I should have also rested my dough in the fridge overnight. So it's not really a conclusive experiment, but I'm enjoying the challenge before I defeat and end up buying a dutch oven....lol  I have a few other ideas that I'd like to try in the near future.

 

The bread was delicious regardless.

Comments

camerjones's picture
camerjones

Those loaves are beautiful!

 

My favorite way of creating steam (I forgot long ago where I picked it up) is to put a towel spread out in a half sheet pan, and the soak the towel with hot (if not boiling) water, and then slide the pan on a rack underneath the baking bread, and then shut the door quickly. I usually steam for 30 minutes, then take the pan out. I don’t like the Dutch oven method as this allows me to bake two loaves at once (i.e., I’m lazy). 

Elsiebake's picture
Elsiebake

Thank you for your comment! A lot of people seem to like the towel method, and I have yet to experiment with just that. I also want to be able to bake more than one loaf at a time, so I'll continue searching for absolutely the best way to steam without a Dutch oven.

yosh's picture
yosh

I guess you could have extended the steam period by adding more ice cubes to the colander?

Elsiebake's picture
Elsiebake

Yes, absolutely, though mine were 2-inch cubes, and those kept melting nice and slow.