The Oven

A brick oven, heated with wood, is far superior to any other for baking bread, as well as for most other purposes. The iron ovens, now commonly attached to kitchen-ranges—the construction of which has within these few years been wonderfully improved—though exceedingly convenient, from the facility which they afford for baking at all hours of the day, do not in general answer well for bread, unless it be made into very small loaves or rolls, as the surface becomes hardened and browned long before the heat has sufficiently penetrated to the centre of the dough. The same objection often exists to iron-ovens of larger size, which require care and management, to ensure the successful use of them. A brick oven should be well heated with faggot wood, or with a faggot, and two or three solid logs; and after it is cleared, the door should be closely shut for quite half an hour before the baking commences: the heat will then be well sustained for a succession, of bread, pies, cakes, and small pastry. The servant who habitually attends at an oven will soon become acquainted with the precise quantity of fuel which it requires, and all other peculiarities which may be connected with it.