October 23, 2016 - 5:20am
Newbie** pizza stone: can I bake pumpkin bread in loaf pans on stone??
hi there! New baker here and I have an oven that cant keep up with the amount I need to bake. I bake pumpkin bread in loaf pans and when i bake more than two at a time (and sometimes just two at a time) they come out different every time.... undercooked in the middle.
my question: would a pizza stone help even Out my oven temperature and if so, do I Put the pizza stone on the rack with the loaf pans or on the bottom rack?
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I have a standard, cheap domestic oven - 68 liter capacity, 2.2Kw heaters. It's a fairly standard UK fan oven - the heating element is round the fan which sucks air in from the oven and expels it over the heater through vents back into the oven.
I can bake 6 x large (950g dough) tin loaves in it without any major issues.
I do use a pizza stone in it for some breads, but not tins.
What I do - let it heat up to 250°C for half an hour. Turn the fan off while loading it (just to stop it blasting hot air out - some ovens cut the fans automatically on door open - this being a cheap one doesn't) Load it quickly then get it going again. Leave it for 12-15 minutes, then open the door, turn the tins and re-set the heat to 210°C. Leave them another 20-30 minutes and they're well baked. Occasionally if I think they're a bit soft, I'll put them back in without the tins for another 5 minutes or so.
So the questions are: What type of oven, what power, what baking time and temperature and how big are your tins?
-Gordon
I dont like moving it so most of the time it stay in the lower third of the oven. I just make sure everything is done by using a digital thermometer!
I leave my stones and a cast iron griddle in the oven even when baking him tins. having more thermal mass in the oven should help it regain temperature after opening and closing the door. Other than that I don't think you'll see a huge benefit.
You can try baking on the stones but there's a chance you could over bake the bottom of the bread.
leaving my pizza stone and a rectangular cast iron griddle in the oven on the racks below the rack where I bake my bread, and after the preheat the oven does seem to hold its temperature better than before. The pizza stone broke (which I think i the fate of all pizza stones) so I replaced it with a cast iron pizza pan. Now with two pieces of large cast iron the oven seems to hold its temperature very well.