Have I over-steamed?
Hi everyone, I've been reading this forum for years and really appreciate all the help you've given me.
I recently decided to build a little oven-within-the-oven for steaming purposes, along the lines of this thread:
http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/2410/homemade-steam-maker-bread-baker [1]
Basically, I have a baking stone and a big lid sits on top of it. There's a small hole drilled into the lid, and just after bread goes on the stone, the lid goes on and I inject steam (from a little Bissell steam cleaner) through the hole. The links I had read suggested 10-20 seconds of steam. I take the lid off after 10 minutes.
My first test went great! I baked my normal whole-wheat loaf in a loaf pan using the master recipe from Peter Reinhart's Whole Greain Breads. My first really dark crust ever in my oven, lots of spring, etc.
For my second test I decided to try the transitional rustic bread from the same book, shaped into mini baguettes. It's a 80% hydration loaf with half whole wheat and half bread flour.
My little contraption could only fit three baguettes but the recipe made four. So for the last one, I heated up a baking stone in my toaster oven and baked it in there. Much to my surprise, the toaster oven one came out by far the best:
It rose higher, and had a dark (if not great) crust. The ones from the "steam" oven were pale, and barely rose at all. They were also tough and dense.
Since it was the same dough, baked in two different ovens, I'm assuming that the steam was the main difference. And I'm guessing that 10-20 seconds of steam was too much. When I took the lid off, the surface of the loaves almost looked like bagel dough that had come out of the water.
Of course, the best thing to do would be to just try again with less steam. But until I can do that, I wonder if these pictures are what you might expect from loaves that just had too much steam?
Thanks for any insight!