In article >, Tim W > wrote:
>Said to be the first ever printed recipe for bread from the anonymous
>
> 'The Good Huswife's Haindmaide for the Kitchen' of 1594.
>Interesting that the dough is made up as 'hard' (dry, stiff?) as possible.
>No high hydration bread there. Also the time taken in the making is very
>short. I can't believe an hour in the oven is the baking time, maybe an hour
>rising in the warm oven before the fire is lit. The yeast is presumably
>brewers yeast in solution, a by-product of beer making.

I don't believe that's quite how the ovens of the time worked. The bread
ovens would be of the domed sort, and the method of use was to jam the
burning material in there until it was up to temperature, then pull all the
embers out, give it a quick mopping, and then do the baking with the
residual heat.

Given that, there really isn't a warm oven for the bread to rise in, nor a
way to simply light the fire. I suspect that the instructions are correct,
given the technology and ingredients of the day.

JB
------------
Jeff Berry - http://www.aspiringluddite.com - food, musings, etc.