Hi, after ~100 loaves I think it's safe to say that I'm quite familiar with open baking sourdough in a home oven. I use a pizza stone and a tray filled with lava rocks at the bottom, which I pour boiling water over to create steam. It's working fine and gives nice bread, but since it is quite a hassle I have been looking for different ways. I am trying out using a stainless steel mixing bowl as a cloche, something which is done quite regularly and with good results, if I need to believe the internet. For me, it's not going so well:
Loaves baked with stainless steel bowl as cloche.
Loaves baked with open bake method.
All my loaves baked with the stainless steel bowl turn out extremely flat and sagged. Preheating the bowl or not doesn't make a difference. The color difference I understand, as the bowl protects the dough from the upper heating element of the oven during the first half, but I don't understand why they all turn out like they have melted...
Thank you!
J
Did you leave the bowl over the dough for the entire bake, or only the first ~15 minutes? I wonder if changing the timing of how long the bowl covers the dough would allow the steam under the pan to set up a good crust, but then dry out when the pan is removed to harden the crust and allow for nice ear formation.