MrsBrown's philosophy of life and stuff

I've been quite bread obsessed this year and I've been trying to work out how to include it in my Festival experience.  Here are my thoughts;

I like the idea of a community bakery.  A place where people can come and have their baking done.  I imagine organising a group of subscribers before Festival, and then use the subscribers to make the oven and fire it each day.  I guess people wouldn't only use it for bread - pastry could also happen as the oven cools.

The oven would need to be big enough for the number of subscribers, but not too big.  It would be good to work out how many loaves can fit in a larger oven and how long it takes to heat up enough for a baking.  Also, how much fuel.  Maybe I could use tenbears oven as the basis for testing/ limits of subscribers.

Thinking a bit further, maybe it could be incorporated into the wine bar and get used in the evening too? No, I need it close to where I'm camping so I don't start hating it.

teehee!  Perhaps I could make dough forms so people can easily carry their loaves to the oven?  Need to check that they're period and in what form.  They're called Brotform or Banneton.  I think I like the fabric style best  - you can use any basket and wash the cloth.

If the fire were started at 8am, assuming a two hour firing time we could all have bread by 10.30.  I could put a table and sunshade over/next to the oven and people could drop off their bread dough in the morning and pick it up later.  Also, I wouldn't have to change my morning routine too much.   If someone got enthusiastic, the oven could be refired for a short time and buns produced at about 12.  People would need to make their bread the night before and leave it for the final rise overnight.

If there were enough subscribers, it could also be fired at 3pm, for bread at 5.30pm.  Bread for this firing could be made in the morning - first thing for sourdough, or lunchtime for yeast.

I also want to run some sourdough breadmaking workshops - including advice on how to fit bread into a Festival routine, period breadmaking equipment and how to use it.  Maybe that could happen first thing Friday morning - making bread and then how to fire the oven could happen at 3pm.  We could make more bread then too, for the next day.

Take a look at the recipe for this cob oven.

I like the sand form for making the dome, and the fact that he mixed the cob in a mixer.

soooo much easier than doing it by hand.

I fired the oven for only an hour tonight, as an experiment. 7.15-8.30pm

First I cooked bread. The base was a bit too hot and I burnt the flour I used to stop the bread from sticking. The bread cooked in about 25-30 min. 9pm

then I put the pear pastry into the oven, as well as the oven thermometer. 9pm

After 5ish minutes, the thermometer said the oven was 350degrees F (sounds better than the equivalent Celcius measure) 9.05

20 min later the pastry was mostly cooked and the oven was 300degrees. 9.25

I've taken the pastry out now and it's cooked but not completely brown. 9.25 (Yum!)

Now I'll see how the jam tarts go. 9.35pm

9.55pm Burnt myself on the jam

10.05 I declare them cooked. The oven was 220degrees F. They're not brown, but the pastry's cooked.