"Wood Fired Oven" Bread

If anyone can help me answer this, I'd appreciate it. There was a cooking programme for kids on the BBC - must have been around 1989 - and it had a blonde lady presenting it. What was it? Anyway, she showed us all the wonder of toast, with butter - and that was my first ever solo cooking moment. Since then, I can safely say i have munched my way through more toast than anything else! Try it with Avocado and Marmite: sounds gross, tastes amazing!

There was a debate between Peter, Orlando and I regarding bread: was it the first foodstuff created by man? It was certainly one of the oldest - the ancient Egyptians used to buy a bread called 'ta' from stalls on dusty streets, and history even has a loaf of bread from the first century AD that survived the wrath of Mount Vesuvius. It looks a bit highly baked mind you.

All cultures have their own version of bread. The basic componants - water and grain flour - can be found in different forms all over the planet and these have given rise to Mexican Tortilla, Indian Chapati, Middle-Eastern Pita and Irish Soda Bread among others. It can be leavened or unleavened, toasted or eaten freshly baked, served with sweet or savoury and at any point during a meal. It's also a great leveller - all stratas of society enjoy bread be it a cheaper supermarket white slice job or an artisan, hand made sourdough. For what it's worth, my preference is for those achingly delicious Italian breads such as Foccacia and Ciabatta that are at their best (in my opinion) when stale and tossed through an amazng tomato salad.

Anyway, the reason for my ramblings is Orlando. He showed me a great technique where you bake a loaf of bread inside a casserole pot - giving it a wood fired oven finish. It really worked, and here is the (it's his not mine) recipe for you to try:

Raynaudes 'Wood-Fired Oven' Loaf
Makes 1 Loaf

Ingredients:

Walnut-sized piece of fresh yeast
300ml luke-warm water
450g strong flour
50g cornmeal
A heavy, oval casserole dish.

Method:

1. Dissolve the water in the yeast. Put the flour plus a touch of salt into a food processor, turn on. Gradually add your yeast mixture. Once it's all combined, mix for a minute or so, then stop. Remove and knead by hand for a minute.
2. Put the dough into a greased bowl, cover and let it rise until it has doubled in size.
3. Turn out onto a lightly floured surface, shape it into a rectangle. Roll up and fold under the edges - you should have a shape like a rugby ball.
4. Cut a piece of greaseproof paper about twice the size of the casserole pot, sprinkle with the cornmeal. Put your loaf onto it, then cover and leave to rise until it's one and a half times it's original size.
5. Put the empty casserole dish into an oven to heat - about 230 degrees centigrade.
6. Remove when the loaf has risen, quickly transfer the loaf, still on the paper, into the hot dish. Cover with the lid.
7. Bake for 30 mins, then remove the lid for a further 10 minutes.
8. Cool on a cooling rack. Do not eat until it's cold!