Islands wrote:
>
> What is a dutch oven?

It's a type of oven of course, ergo the name... it's a vessel of a
configuration that is used for baking directly in an open fire,
typically when no other oven is available or in conjunction with a
stationery chambered oven. However nowadays the name "Dutch Oven" is
really used as a misnomer, as it's used to describe any large pot
(which is really a sauce pot and not a dutch oven at all, has no
semblence to a dutch oven at all) typically used to cook stews and
soups, not for baking. Hardly anyone these days owns an actual dutch
oven, and even if they did they'd have no way to properly use it in
their home... modern homes don't have open cooking hearths. The last
time homes in the US were built with open cooking hearths (which also
served as central heating) was about 1850.

> If a recipe requires one is there something else I can use?

There are no recipes whatsoever that "require" a dutch oven... just
bake in whatever oven you have in your kitchen. A dutch oven is not a
stew pot... even hundreds of years ago when all cooking was over an
open fire stew pots were very different from dutch ovens.

Sheldon