Scoring and Steaming
Aug 10th, 2008 by SteveB
When properly performed, the techniques of scoring and steaming both serve to improve the quality and esthetics of the finished bread. Scoring provides a place for the controlled expansion of the loaf during the oven spring phase of baking, thus contributing to the lightness of crumb and visual attractiveness of the loaf. Steaming during the first few minutes of baking serves a dual purpose; it delays the setting of the crust so that maximum oven spring can be achieved and it helps gelatinize the starch at the surface, giving the loaf a beautiful, shiny crust.
Scoring
As I see it, the condition of the dough immediately prior to scoring has as much, if not more, of an impact on the ability to perform a proper scoring as the baker’s scoring technique itself. If the dough is too strong, the gluten strands at the site of scoring will not give during the oven spring and the cuts will not open properly. Interestingly, poorly opened cuts can also result from an insufficient or overabundant use of steam during the bake. If the dough is too weak, the blade will snag on the dough and the baker runs the risk of deflating the dough as he or she is performing the scoring.
The manner in which the scoring is performed is dependent upon such factors as the dough composition, the loaf shape and the effect the baker wishes to achieve. To score a typical boule, the blade should be held perpendicular to the surface of the loaf and drawn quickly, in one motion, across the surface of the dough. I find a lame fitted with a double-edge razor blade to be ideally suited to the task. For a baguette or batard, the blade should be held at a slight angle to the dough surface so that the blade lifts up a small flap of dough when the score is made. During baking, this dough flap produces the well-known and much sought after ”grigne” of a properly scored baguette or batard.
Steaming
Steaming has always been problematic for the home baker. Without the steam injection systems available in commercial deck ovens, the home baker has had to resort to any one of a number of different techniques to generate steam. These techniques have included spraying the walls of the oven with a water mist just prior to and after loading, as well as throwing ice cubes into the oven at the time of loading, either directly onto the oven floor or into a pre-heated pan.
For ovens which don’t have a tight seal (such as mine), I find both of the above techniques to be deficient. The clouds of steam released by my oven whenever either of these techniques was employed led me to look for other, more efficient means of steam generation and usage.
The recent resurgence of “no-knead” bread helped provide me with a clue. This bread is baked in a covered dutch oven, thereby confining the steam released by the dough during baking. In essence, the dough acts as its own steam generator. A cover placed over a free-form bread while baking should serve the same purpose.
At about this time, I was made aware of the Steam Bread Maker, a product offered for sale which consists of a metal cover with a small inlet hole and a hand-held steamer. The idea here is to not only cover the dough but also to inject steam into the cover through the cover’s inlet hole. It was easy enough to put together my own steaming system, especially since I already owned a hand-steamer. An inverted buffet serving tray, inexpensively obtained at my local restaurant supply store, proved to be ideal for use as the cover.
The entire scoring, loading and steaming sequence can be seen below:[qt:http://www.breadcetera.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/08/ScoringSteaming.mov 500 375]My scoring of this loaf could have been better; I needed two passes to give the desired cut where it should (and normally does) take only one. The final loaf resulting from this procedure can be seen here.
Ok, I see one of the problems was that I was thinking I should only leave the cover on for 5 minutes or so. I see now everyone says 10-15 minutes.
Hi Greg,
It is, indeed, possible to use too much steam. I typically steam for 4-5 seconds, but leave the inverted hotel pan over my loaves until the first sign of browning, typically 10-15 minutes.
Hello everybody !
I find this blog gorgeous and very useful. On steaming, I have found a way of doing it which is working well : I put 2 quarry tiles in water for five minutes and I put them in the oven 2 mn before inserting the brad. since the heating elements are burning the upper side of the bread ( the oven is at his max (230° F and the electric resistances are red…) I put my tiles just under the electric resistances to have strong steam and to protect the bread from the radiations.
a bientÁ´t !
Didier
Hi Didier,
Thank you for sharing your method of steaming with us. There are a number of ways of producing oven steam and as you’ve indicated, oven design can be a major factor in determining which method is most effective in a given situation. Thanks for providing another option to consider.
I love your technique. I went another direction with the steaming. Being a retired engineer, I naturally worked out a much more complex solution! I converted an old pressure cooker to use as a steam generator. A small valve and small diameter tubing controls and pipes the water to the oven. Since the water is at 12 – 15 PSI, it flashes to super-heated steam as soon as it leaves the plumbing. I like the simplicity of a hand held steamer, and a cover/containment for the loaf.
Hi Jack,
Complexity and elegance are not necessarily mutually exclusive! 🙂
I once considered a steaming approach similar to your own but because of the design of my gas-fueled oven (very well-ventilated), any steam introduced into the oven would quickly dissipate. Hence the need, in my case, to trap the steam under a hotel pan.
Hello Steve,
It’s a wonderful post about steaming and I must say, your blog is fabulous. I have one question about your steaming system. Even though it might sound a bit silly, but it keep coming back to my mind as I read all comments of you and others on this post.
Your steaming system is basically provide steam to a close system of inverted buffet pan tray baking stone through a small inlet hole on the tray, If I recall correctly. My question is how you drill the hole on the tray in order for the steam to just go in, not escape out of the system during baking. In my limited knowledge of science, steam suppose to rise up, and your hole is quite near the top of the tray, why can you keep the steam inside the system?
Your works have been a great motivation for me in artisan baking. I hope someday you will have time for blogging again and return.
Rose,
Hi Rose,
Thank you for your kind words regarding Bread cetera.
Regarding the steaming method described, for the 10-15 minutes that the inverted pan is in use, any amount of steam lost through the small inlet hole would be relatively insignificant as compared to the total amount of steam injected under the pan.
[…] http://www.breadcetera.com/?p=85#more-85 […]
This is an excellent idea. You could also try placing a hand towel soaked in boiling water inside a pan – this tends to dispense more steam than a normal pan of water
After watching your video, I went back and re-watched the part where you put the bread in the oven. After multiple viewings I am still unable to wrap my head around how you managed to pull out the peel so perfectly, and with such a minimum of effort. I see that you have employed some white plastic clamp-type thingies, as well as added what looks like a plastic or porcelain slab over the wood portion of the peel itself. Would you please tell me what’s up with peels, ’cause I am beating myself up over my bad habit of flubbing what should be a simple step. Thanks, your blog is boss!
BTW I am a pizza-maker as well as a bread-maker.
Hi Phil,
I use a custom-made SuperPeel to load my breads into the oven. Information on the SuperPeel can be found here.
Steve,
great site!! Been looking all over hell for a cover pan about 6’deep by 20X15 ” any suggestions. thanks
Hi John,
You should be able to find large hotel pans at your local restaurant supply store.
As a real amateur on bread making, I am jealous of the pictures of your bread. I have a quick question on your steamer system. Do you heat the pan when you preheat the oven? I was wondering of the temperature drop and if the steam will condense on the pan. I can see the steam rises to the top, condenses on the steel and escapes through the hole without really “touching” my bread. Maybe my mental picture is wrong. Any thoughts?
Hi Diego,
While the oven is preheating, I place the hotel pan on the range on top of the oven. The heat escaping from the oven vent heats the pan. This probably isn’t necessary, though, because the relatively thin metal of the pan will come up to temperature very quickly when placed in the oven. Also, the steamer expels steams fairly forcefully, ensuring that the steam reaches the baking loaves.
Steve, Thanks! I guess that as I have never seen one of these steamers at work, so that is probably why I have a hard time visualizing it. I just ordered one from Amazon (should arrive tomorrow), so I guess I will give it a try soon. I need to get a “lid” like your pan and will do that this weekend :-).
I have been struggling with steam and just recently heard about using an inverted deep pan over the bread to trap the bread on steam. I tried this in a large commercial convection oven. I don’t understand why having the pan over the bread wasn’t enough to get the shiny crust?
Hi P,
If your dough is of low enough hydration and the volume of your pan is much greater than the volume of the breads being baked, there may not be a high enough concentration of steam within the inverted pan to produce the shiny crust you are after. One way to insure a high concentration of steam around the loaves is to introduce the steam through a small hole in the pan using a hand-held steamer, as shown here.
I noticed that when using this method, my grigne are very dark inside. I think it’s because by the time the cover is removed, the cuts have already fully opened and they start browning at the same time as the rest of the exterior. Without the cover, the bread exterior would heat up faster, giving it head start over the cuts
What has been your experience?
Hi Greg,
I’ve never obtained an overly-darkened grigne using the above procedure. A typical grigne obtained is shown here.
Hmmm, that’s very nice. Mine are as fully dark as anything on the crust. I guess that rules out this method as the problem. Are you cuts fully opened by the time your cover comes off?
Thanks
Greg,
I’d estimate that almost all of the oven spring occurs prior to removal of the cover. When the cover is removed and the steam allowed to dissipate, the crust should still be quite pale with only a hint of browning beginning to show.
Thank you, Steve.
Until I can get a better oven, the kitchen I rent only has convection. When I baked on sheet pans, the current would lift up the perimeter of the boule and they would come out looking like flying saucers. Then I switched to aluminum pots (with the handles removed but the hole plugged with a screw and nut) This worked for trapping the steam, but after I remove the lid to finish off the loaf the convection dries it out and it totally loses its shininess. So then I would leave the lids on until the very end, but would have to take them off to brown the tops. When I do this I get bread that looks like it has boils or chicken pox all over it. Any suggestions? Thanks.
p,
The shine of a loaf’s crust, assuming no egg or cornstarch wash has been applied, comes from the steam-promoted gelatinization of surface starch and should not be lost from ‘drying out’. Perhaps not enough steam is being generated by the loaf during baking. This might be caused by insufficient dough hydration or perhaps even insufficient proofing.
Awesome. Thank you so much for the advice and your prompt response. Have a great day!
Steve,
Thank you so much for the information. I am new to bread making and look forward to learning from your experience! I have a Fornetto wood fired oven that I plan on using when I bake bread. This oven is not a domed brick oven. Do I need to modify the recipe and/or process when baking bread in this type of wood fired oven?
Hi Jim,
Having never had the opportunity to bake bread in a wood fired oven, I’m not in the position of being able to provide any definitive recommendations in that area. I would imagine that no changes to the recipe should be needed. Baking and steaming times may need to be adjusted to fit thermal characteristics of your oven.
Great information about steaming loaves! The HearthKits aren’t available on Amazon anymore. Would a large pizza stone work just as well? Also, because it’s crusty rolls that we love, would the same procedure work for rolls? Would you place them on parchment paper and slide them onto the stone that way? Any suggestions will be greatly appreciated. Thanks!
Hi Susan,
Yes, the same procedure should work fine for baking crusty rolls. Using a large pizza stone and parchment paper in the way you described should also work well.