The only reason I’m showing you this photo is because I used my oven’s convection feature for this loaf. It’s a rye sourdough - roughly 1/4 dark rye flour and 3/4 bread flour using my sourdough starter. Baked covered for about 30 minutes and uncovered for around 10 minutes. Did not soak the clay cover for the first time and it worked fine.
Not sure if the convection added anything but clearly the loaf browned evenly whereas some other loafs have browned unevenly.
Just curious if others are using their convection for baking rather than the conventional oven.
I’ve never heard of soaking the cover of a clay baker! What’s the purpose of it? How do you actually do it? Do you preheat anything (top&bottom? just bottom?) Just wondering!
I have not had good results with convection [for bread] and don’t use it, but that is just my experience in my oven, etc. My oven is new-ish and supposedly “true convection”, but it seemed like outside got too done and inside underdone. I didn’t do much experimentation as I get results I like without the convection.
Arlo48 - apparently many people soak their clay pots before placing in the oven cold - especially the un-glazed tops. Un-glazed bottoms do not need soaking. For the past few loaves I did soak the top by filling it up with water. This time, after reading some reviews by those using clay bakers, I decided to forego the soaking.
Here’s my convection loaf. I’d say there is not a big difference between convection and non-convection in my oven. My guess is that there is no difference at all for the first part of the bake while the clay baker cover is on.
The only real difference I noticed is that the crust may be a little on the thinner / crispy side as opposed to the thicker / chewy side. I kind of like that difference, so I’ll probably try it again to see if that seems consistent.
(For the sake of consistency, this loaf is not a rye sourdough - it’s 1/3 hard white and 2/3 red fife, 100% whole grain, all home-milled, long slow fermentation with tiny amount of cold, unfed starter).
Loaf looks great - fascinating combo of flours. You are likely correct about the impact of the convection during covered baking. Possibly though, the convection process may distribute the heat in the oven avoiding hot spots with the clay cover on?
I haven’t noticed much difference in the crust but I do notice a more even browning using the convection.
That certainly seems possible, though my new oven already bakes unbelievably evenly in conventional baking mode (i know because my old one didn’t), so I wouldn’t know.
