What are you baking today (2025)?

Not my best loaf, but I’m experimenting (something a really, really hate doing!):

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MrsT bought me a rather large clay loaf pan. Problem is, the company that makes it is German, and virtually all their clay bakers (and they have a lot of them) come with clay covers. That’s sort of the point, it’s like a clay Dutch oven (casserole to some of you here).

The usual method is to get your bread in the pan, soak the lid in water, cover the pan, then bake it at a fairly high temp, starting in the cold oven so you don’t crack your clay. The wet lid then produces steam and…well, you know the rest.

Alternately, you can preheat the clay pan and use it more or less like a regular Dutch oven, like when you make no-knead overnight bread.

Since 99.999% of their products are for covered bakers, all their recipes are for using the lid, soaked or unsoaked, adjusting baking temps, etc and exactly none of them are for the basic loaf pan with no cover.

Me being the anally-retentive nut that I am when it comes to following instructions have spent countless hours trying to glean an exact recipe from multiple sources, including the manufacturer, the main US retailer (who no longer sells them), various bread sites…no one, and I mean no one, uses just the lidless loaf clay baker.

After all that, I’ve devised two sort of hybrid methods, and that loaf is from the first method, soaking the loaf pan and starting in a cold oven.

Tastes ok, but it took forever, rise is ok, but I think it wanted a higher temp.

I’ll be working on adjustments and the other method in the day to come. One thing about bread, it’s really hard to mess up.
 
TastyReuben said:
Not my best loaf, but I’m experimenting (something a really, really hate doing!):

View attachment 135079

MrsT bought me a rather large clay loaf pan. Problem is, the company that makes it is German, and virtually all their clay bakers (and they have a lot of them) come with clay covers. That’s sort of the point, it’s like a clay Dutch oven (casserole to some of you here).

The usual method is to get your bread in the pan, soak the lid in water, cover the pan, then bake it at a fairly high temp, starting in the cold oven so you don’t crack your clay. The wet lid then produces steam and…well, you know the rest.

Alternately, you can preheat the clay pan and use it more or less like a regular Dutch oven, like when you make no-knead overnight bread.

Since 99.999% of their products are for covered bakers, all their recipes are for using the lid, soaked or unsoaked, adjusting baking temps, etc and exactly none of them are for the basic loaf pan with no cover.

Me being the anally-retentive nut that I am when it comes to following instructions have spent countless hours trying to glean an exact recipe from multiple sources, including the manufacturer, the main US retailer (who no longer sells them), various bread sites…no one, and I mean no one, uses just the lidless loaf clay baker.

After all that, I’ve devised two sort of hybrid methods, and that loaf is from the first method, soaking the loaf pan and starting in a cold oven.

Tastes ok, but it took forever, rise is ok, but I think it wanted a higher temp.

I’ll be working on adjustments and the other method in the day to come. One thing about bread, it’s really hard to mess up.
Click to expand...
Bit of a read here on baking in covered contraptions. I've done that recipe and it works.
 
Barriehie said:
Bit of a read here on baking in covered contraptions. I've done that recipe and it works.
Click to expand...
But my point is, mine doesn’t have a cover, but because the company that makes these primarily makes the covered ones, their included instructions and recipe book cover only the covered ones.

It’s like mine was just an afterthought.
 
The crust, from what I can see of it, looks like you got the temp and the humidity in the oven right. Also, for humidity in the oven, most ovens have this thing:
1000039753.jpg


I put a tuna fish can with water on top of that vent pipe to keep steam in there...
 
Barriehie said:
The crust, from what I can see of it, looks like you got the temp and the humidity in the oven right. Also, for humidity in the oven, most ovens have this thing:View attachment 135083

I put a tuna fish can with water on top of that vent pipe to keep steam in there...
Click to expand...
I was just thinking about blocking my steam vent. :laugh:
 
It's National Bread Day!
Last night from the far corners of my brain, I decided that I needed to bake some Bread.
I have a coupla really great recipes, and haven't made any Bread for FIVE YEARS!!!

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I put this to rise last night about 7pm.
Stashed it in the oven that was turned off to rise overnight.

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One of my Neighborhood Gal Pals, who gets me and I get her, gave me this as a birthday gift years ago, can't remember when exactly, but this was the first time I've used it. Pretty cool.

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Now we wait.
DH is very impatient and is insisting that I make this up... "you have to wait 1 hour for it to cool. You never cut into a loaf of Bread straight out of the oven, period."
 
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