Artisan Bread cooked in Halogen Oven

furndire

Not sure which thread to put this in, as it cross two different ones. After reading about the Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a day, I decided to at last have ago. You have to prepare the dough (for about 3-14 days worth, depending on how much bread you eat) and then take off what you require the next day. You do NOT need to knead the dough at all, just stir everything togethere. I can't put the recipe on here, as although its simple to do, its a lot of typing to do.

Yesterday I cooked my bread made from the Artisan book in the halogen oven. It worked really well - and saved having to pre heat the oven. After using the Artisan recipe my bread maker is going to be redundant, and I will be making bread every day.
Down side is you don't wake up to a cooked loaf.
Until now I have been sceptical about the cost of the use electric used in the bread maker so have not used it so much. Especially when a loaf fails.

windsor64

Hi Furndire please could you advise me of the cooking times you allowed for the Artisan Bread as i was going to buy a bread maker but might as well give my halogen a go, thanks for any help you can give

furndire

I didn't check the timing unfortunately - I think it was about the same time as in the oven. The one thing I did do though was protect it from burning by using the steamer plate (don't know what its called) on top of the higher stand. I also found that it was slightly underdone, so turned the bread over for a short while at end - thats the beauty of the halogen, if something isn't quite cooked you can turn it over, and put it back in, as the almost instant heat brings it quickly back to temparature.
My first lot of dough was very wet, so flattened out quite a bit.
The second time, I forgot to change the setting from thaw to the highest when I thought I was letting it rise!!! so when I went back to turn it on properly, it was almost properly cooked. I made bread buns with another lot. You wouldn't want to put the oven on to make 3 or 4 bread buns.
I'm still really experimenting, but it does work.
Sorry to be so vague, timing isn't my strong point!!!!
Re the artisan bread recipe, I even let my granddaughter mix/stir up the ingredients last night to put in the fridge for today, its so easy to do.
I have just bought myself another container so that I can have two lots of different dough on the go at the same time.
I made up the brioche recipe so was experimenting with ways of using that dough for four days. Made the almond and chocolate ones, they were made rolling them up again as I slightly undercooked it, I had to whip them out of the oven, and turn them over quickly.
Another thing I did was make one lot into tomato bread, but rolling a portion of dough out, and adding about a third of a jar of sun dried toms, chopped and sprinkled on the square of dough, then sort of rolled it up and baked it in a loaf tin in the Halogen. That is really tasty and keeps really well.
The next time I do some, I will try and remember to take more notice of what I do, and maybe get a photo on here.

furndire

I have just baked a batch of bread. I used about 1/3 of stored dough (I had added some Malt grain flour to it & dry black olives). It took about 30 mins to rise in halogen oven, set on thaw setting - next time I will set for about 10 mins on that setting and then turn it off and leave for the next 20 mins, as seemed to be getting a bit too warm. I then put a drop of hot water in the bottom of the bowl, and set up as in below photo, then cooked at 240 for 20 mins, then another 10 mins at 200. I then took it out, turned it over, and cooked for another 10 mins on 240.
Its delicious.

the steamer plate acts as difuser so the bread doesn't burn.



Freshly baked olive bread with a cup of Malted Grain Flour

Edit to say the loaf has almost gone!!!!!!!! OH "that looks good, I think I'll have a slice with a cup of tea. 5 mins later - "don't bother with making a meal, I'll just have a couple more slices of that bread" DD has just done the same.

windsor64

Hi furndire thanks for the info very kind of you, may i ask why it has to be on thaw for a while sorry to be so dense

furndire

I put it on thaw instead of leaving bread in a warm place to rise. I don't really have warm places in the house - no airing cupboard etc.

tomterm8

That actually looks very good to me, one of my problems is that I cook bread for someone with bad teeth sometimes, and it is hard to stop bread going crusty. The halogen oven doesn't seem to make crusty bread from the look of it.

furndire

That loaf certainly wasn't crusty, I think putting a bit of water in the bottom of the bowl helped. In the Artisan book they say to put a container with hot water in the oven - the steam is supposed to keep bread softer, so it may be worth trying that.
It also doesn't get too much of a crust because I can turn the bread over in the halogen oven and cook the bottom side without the top getting overcooked. I have even done this in ordinary oven, but you have to be quite quick!!! I don't particularly like too much of a crust on the bread either.