One of the many ways that I had planned on increasing the return on our wood stove investment was to use a stove top oven ($30 on gift card) for baking. Easier said than done apparently. My first few attempts were on the cold side with the oven only reaching the 250 degrees when the stove was @ a full fire.
Woods, believes that the poor quality of the wood we have been burning is to blame.
Neither here nor there as I still need to bake.
And we all know that not using the free heat to bake with was driving me crazy Lucy, crazy.
Red silicone baking mats ($15) paper & butterfly clipped in place increased the oven's heat retention.
And yes it took me a good day to figure out what I could use to hold the mats in place.
Stove top oven holds one pie, one 8" cake pan, or two regular loaf pans. It also holds my cast iron muffin pan - 6 small muffins.
Blueberry pie (grew & canned the filling), took over an hour and half to bake. Not as browned on the top crust as I would have liked but the filling was bubbling out so I pulled it. Not as pretty as I would have liked. Only two hearts are perfect.
Whole house smells like pie.
Stove top oven with an added oven thermometer as the door gauge is about 100 degrees too low. I really only use inside thermometer (borrowed from ice box) when I first place a pan in. After that we gauge the baking time by the given bake time then by the scent.
Not an exact science but then wood stove cooking & baking isn't.
Practice practice practice.
~~ pelenaka ~~
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I have a stove top oven too and use it often. Mine is different, has baffles in it and that may be the difference. I have baked cookies, pies, casseroles and even roasted chicken and turkeys in it. I think they are great. I have been planning on doing a post on it soon, but first want to paint it with "stove black" so it looks better.
ReplyDeletewhere did you get it???? I know its been years since you posted this. just saw the site
Deletehttp://amzn.to/1hNqy4A
DeleteUnder $30 if you have Prime.
YAY! Thanks to you and your blog post I am getting a small wood burning stove and a camp oven. I can't believe how much money we are saving!! Thank you!!!
ReplyDelete(bowing @ the waist uttering your welcome) Good, I'm glad I could help. Mind you not that I'm against those wonderful cook stoves just not all of us homesteaders rural or urban have the set up or the mullah for one.
ReplyDeleteNow we have to score you a good deal on one of those camp stoves.
I have another oven that I bought years before we installed this stove. It's actually made for a kerosene stove. It's black with a teal blue trim on the door. It would fit a small turkey.
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately it was too big for this stove not to mention that I would go crazy trying to keep a hot enough fire (with our low BTU firewood)going to heat an oven that big.
Post a pic soon, Kat. Us oven fanatics wanna see !