July 9, 2020 - 7:24am
Tip - Time required for max Oven Spring and Ear Formation
At this time I think that the time required to reach maximum oven spring and ear formation is dependent upon many variables. Such as oven heat, thermal mass in the oven, steam, flour types, and a host of other variables. But, in order to get a ball park idea of the time required, a time lapse video was produced and from that video images were extracted at 1 minute intervals.
The results of that test is below.
The video is best viewed using THIS LINK.
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Dan, I love your work. Agreed on the flour , temp, and size of the loaf making a difference. What was the total bake time? I wonder if there is a rule of thumb ratio?
These baked out in 16 minutes.
When I first typed it , I had typed that there were many rules of thumb that I had read, and one was 1/3, but deleted it because many use 2/3 covered 1/3 open when using a Dutch Oven
Barry, never thought of a ratio for steaming, but 1/3 steam might be correct, I generally go 1/2 because too much steam never bothered me. Never had a problem with too much. Often the oven is not vented. Sometimes without opening the door I just turn the oven to convection.
If too much steam was a problem. I should have experienced it by now.u
Side Note -
It seems high pressure steam is not the best. Recently started flowing low pressure steam into the oven over an 8 to 10 minute time with great success. Low pressure via PC is produced by opening the flow valve completely and regulating the flow using the heat settings on the stovetop.
If you are willing to wade through the CB Baguette bakes of mine you can see the results in the latter bakes. But the CB is very congested, we have toped 700 replies so far.
In my oven, using a steam pan and a baking steel, I find that a hearth-baked loaf generally reaches its maximum expansion in about 5 minutes. This seems to be true for most any loaves I bake - loaf size and shape, hydration level, flour mix and so forth don't affect it much.
So my experience supports Dan's video (or the other way around!).
TomP