Native American Foods: Technology and Food Sources: Oven Baking

Oven-baked foods, as distinguished from ash-baked “breads,” stone-baked flatbreads, and boiled dumplings, became traditional comparatively recently. Baking, in the modern sense of the word, did not exist in precontact America—there is no archaeological evidence of ovens. The enclosures that resembled ovens—pit ovens—were steaming chambers and did not produce the crisp texture and intense flavor associated with baking. Sixteenth-century Spanish explorers brought hornos (Spanish for “ovens”) to the Southwest along with the concept of baking yeast-leavened wheat bread. The tribes of this region built large adobe ovens outdoors and small ones indoors to bake the new breads and to dry foods such as chilies.