If I bake bread in a closed container (Dutch Oven, EH Baguette Baker), is it necessary to preheat the oven? I would think that baking in the convection mode could start as soon as the oven is up to the desired temp. I don't preheat the containers when I bake nor do I uses a baking stone. An hour or so of preheating seems to be a waste of energy.
Take a look ta this.
http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/16588/side-side-comparison-loaves-baked-cold-start-v-preheated-oven-photos
Dan, I don't think the link you provided is pertinent here. In my case, I'm putting the dough in a sealed air-temp container, placing it on the oven rack (no stone), into an oven preheated to xx degrees in convection mode. My fundamental question is whether it matters if the oven has been at the desired temp for an hour or one minute. I think not.
Read further down the post for the baking tests I did a few years ago.
http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/54855/longest-dough-prep-ever-and-few-experimental-trials
Here is a good experiment about preheating.
https://youtu.be/8CyYA-p1dMA
" I don't preheat the containers when I bake nor do I uses a baking stone."
If the cold D.O. is part of your standard procedure, then you are correct: all you need to pre-heat is the air in the oven.
The "Pre-heat for an hour" saying assumes you are heating up a stone or a dutch oven during the pre-heat.
I think the others might not have picked up that your use of a cold D.O. was a "given."
Wouldn’t you think the walls, floor, and top of the oven would benefit from stored heat retention from a preheat at temp?
I have no experience nor have I tested this, but it makes sense to me.
Dan, if it were a heavy commercial oven (I'm thinking of the range-ovens in those big "institutional" kitchens that many older churches have), or old fashioned cast iron/steel, then you'd be correct. But modern convection ovens are thin-walled steel with some insulation (even if it's just an empty air space). That thin metal will come up to temp quickly with the hot air flowing on it.
Whatever radiant heat may be lacking from the walls, is more than made up for by the quick heat-transfer of convection mode upon the dutch oven. Especially if his fan setting is "always on" as opposed to "only on when heating element is on."
idave seems to be on the mark, at least in my thinking. Dan, I'm using the convection mode, meaning that heat is transferred to the cooking vessel by way of hot air circulation. Not radiant heat from the mass of the oven.
Convection is what I bake with to prevent hot spots in my oven. The front right hand corner burns stuff so this prevents that. I do heat my pots in the oven for an hour on convection because I found that the hot pots gave me better oven spring. If you don’t care, then whatever you do will work!
I baked a few loaves using a pre-heated DO. Too difficult for me to deal with handling the dough into the hot container so I gave it up. As I remember, it didn't make any difference in the final product.