Using a dutch oven really improved my sourdough loaves

Sure, I can get all those types of bread, and more besides, within walking distance too…despite living far from the pinnacle of civilization known as Europe.

Most people can also buy ready-made food close to home, and yet billions of people around the world still cook in their own kitchens.

Each household has their own constellation of reasons why they bake bread, or cook, or whatever. It’s not a binary situation.

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It’s not a binary situation.

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I live above a family bakery. I still bake most of our pastries and fresh bread. Why?

  • the bromated flour and hydro-whatevered oils make me ill
  • it’s much cheaper, usually
  • I can have whatever I have a taste for, whenever I want
  • It makes me happy
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You rock! :metal::sunglasses::metal:

It’s amazing what playing with time and temperature can do. Next you can incorporate things like folding during the early part of the first rise which help condition the dough for a better rise later. You can also play with things like shaping techniques, pre-ferments that boost flavor, using different flours, and sourdough starters. You can find tons of stuff on-line and you can make a lot of different breads without special equipment or ingredients.

Hm. I don’t have a dutch oven, but I do have large deep Corningware, big enough for a loaf. That should provide the thermal buffering and humidity containment needed, right?

Rhetorical question really. I’ll give it a try.

A big Corningware dish might even be closer to a traditional bread baking cloche.

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I live in the UK.

Things are better than they were which I attribute to our great benefactors, the Poles.

But getting good bread is still nowhere near as simple and easy as in, say, Germany.

Even where you can get it, English people’s ideas of when you want to buy your bread are a bit of a shock. In Germany, I’d expect a bakery to be out of fresh loaves and bread rolls by say 8am on a weekend unless I’d pre-ordered.

Here, the shops aren’t even open at 8am or where they are, they certainly haven’t even started baking.

Also, my wife is severely lactose intolerant and commercial bakeries tend to stick lactose in all kinds of breads where it doesn’t really belong/isn’t needed or just make their non-dairy containing breads in close proximity to products which do contain lactose which makes buying bread difficult.

Also, fun. Mainly fun.

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The only thing to be aware of is that the black bake-lite-esque heat resistant knobs on top are not rated for 500F and may crack.

Or just melt. That was a nice smell. (Not.)

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