Woodie first batch
Had the wood oven for over two years, we've baked all sorts and cooked all sorts in there plenty of times, but the bread loaves were always the last thing to go in and be baked once the oven had cooled and with no issues.
A few days ago I decided to prepare some SD and some regular bread for baking early saturday morning. Saturday dawned, I was up at 6 in pitch darkness and had the oven lit right away. By 8 I had embers burning down and almost ready to sweep out the floor
By 8.30 all was clean and ready, only the temp was still too high so I checked every few minutes with my infra red gun thermometer.
My SD loaves were well inflated and looked like they might collapse at any minute so they had to go in at a little too high a temp. The floor was 270 C and the walls were still up at 330 C. In they went whilst I waited on the regular loaves to finish proofing.
I knew I should check the SD loaves quite soon for browning and after 10 minutes I did. But the tops were quite blistered and burnt, so out they came quick smart. I quickly fashioned some "chinese hats" from ali foil and placed them on top of the loaves for the duration of the bake. Once at 96 C internal temp I took the loaves out and they looked great except for the awful black tops ! The oven spring on these SD loaves was excellent.
By this time, 9.00 am, the oven had reached a better temp of 220 for the floor and the walls were now around 280 C. I made a mistake with my proofing and the regular loaves could have done with another hour of proofing but I decided that oven spring might kick in and give me the result I was wanting.
But no, they emerged after 35 minutes, looking beautiful, with the score cuts looking great too, but the loaves were still a bit heavy and underproofed. Once cut open I realised they were still quite good and great to eat.
This first effort at batch baking was a bit experimental in that I was unsure about how accurately I would bring together all the timing factors of the SD bread which took two days, the regular bread which I had mixed the day before with less yeast so as they would proof overnight and be "just right" the next morning at 8.30 !
It was pretty much a success with the SD proofing at just the right time and the regular loaves taking a little longer.
I have made good notes and hope that the next batch will coordinate perfectly.
Paul.