Did you know that the Big Green Egg is the perfect oven for baking bread? Master Baker Hiljo Hillebrand, an avid EGGer himself, shares why as well as the most important ins and outs of baking bread here. Of course, we’ll also include a couple of delicious bread recipes you can bake on your kamado.
Hiljo is a true bread baking expert. He grew up in his parents’ bakery and took his father’s advice by attending one of the best baking training programmes in the country: the Wageningen Vocational School . After that, he went on to work in other positions like a bread product developer, he was commissioned to create a complete line of bread made of only organic ingredients and he started working as a baking adviser. In the meantime, he joined the Dutch Boulangerie Team and as of October 2013, Hiljo has carried the title of Master Baker. That is a title that so far only 7 bakers have managed to achieve: the highest possible acknowledgement within the world of baking.
‘For me, the title of Master Baker is the crowning achievement of my craft, ’ Hiljo says. ‘It tests aspects such as your experience and vision within the trade. But my favourite thing about baking bread is taking grain – a product of nature – and turning it into something delicious, with endless options for variation. Nothing is too outlandish! And that’s what makes baking bread so addictive. I mean, there are tons of options for the filling alone. You can knead almost any filling you want into the dough. You might make the dough too weak or too dry, but practice makes perfect. The possibilities are endless!’
Bread — Blog — Food I Love
‘What’s great about baking bread in the Big Green Egg is that traditionally, bread used to be baked with fire, ’ Hiljo goes on to say. ‘The electric oven wasn’t used until the late 19
Century. But with the Big Green Egg, which also uses fire to bake the bread, your bread will be not only more authentic, it’s also given a more intense flavour because of that great roasting taste. The ceramic material plays a big role in that. It absorbs the heat and radiates it back towards the bread, making your crust better and crispier than an electric oven would.’
‘When you’re baking bread, something to take into account is how much liquid you’re adding. Don’t add it all at once; set some of it aside first. Flour is a natural product and varies widely in quality, meaning that sometimes you need a little less and sometimes you need a little more liquid. When you’re kneading the dough, you’ll feel whether the dough is too solid and whether you need to add more liquid or not. And here, too: practice makes perfect. If the dough is too weak, you can always knead some extra flour into the dough.
Wild Garlic Focaccia On The Large Big Green Egg
‘If you want to know if your dough has been kneaded well enough, try to pull off a thin tiny layer . If you can without the layer ripping, it means that the gluten has developed enough to bake a nice and fluffy loaf of bread, which will also rise properly. The temperature of the dough is also important for the rising process, ’ Hiljo adds. ‘The temperature of the dough after kneading should be somewhere between 24 and 27°C. That’s the ideal temperature for activating the yeast. So: knowledge is power – your core thermometer will definitely come in handy there!’
‘It’s also important to round your dough properly or shape it into a proper point after the bulk of it has risen. After that initial rising process, press the air out of the dough and divide it into the number of portions you want. The purpose of rounding the dough is to put tension on the network of gluten that has formed. You round the portion(s) into a ball by first kneading the dough into a long shape. Then, you roll it up and place it with the seam facing up. Then you roll the dough again and place your hands on the sides, just under the dough. By moving your hands along the ball of dough and pushing the dough a little underneath the ball, you create the proper tension and a nice round ball. Pointing or folding the dough serves a similar purpose.’
You can bake most breads directly on the Baking Stone. ‘What’s great about the Baking Stone is how it conducts heat, ’ Hiljo explains. ‘Initially, it sends the heat up evenly from the bottom. Because of that, a crust forms on the bottom of the bread immediately, creating a base, after which the bread still has room to rise up. The heat that comes off the stone makes for a beautiful oven rising process. Basically, you always want to preheat the stone in the Big Green Egg for about 15 minutes. You usually won’t need any parchment paper on the Baking Stone, but if you have really sticky dough or a lot of filling that could stick to the stone, I would recommend using it just to be sure.’
Baking Bread On The Bge Using A Dutch Oven And Parchment Paper
You can also bake some breads in the Cast Iron Dutch Oven or the Green Dutch Oven. Hiljo: ‘For larger breads and especially those with a weaker dough, baking the loaf in a cast iron pan in the Big Green Egg is ideal. The pan kind of serves as your baking tin, and supports the dough. That way, the dough has nowhere to go but up. The pan makes the Baking Stone unnecessary, because the heat radiated from the ceramic material heats up the cast iron in no time. My advice, when you’re baking bread in the Big Green Egg for the first time, would be to start by baking a bread in the pan. Not much can go wrong there, because of the shape of the pan. Even if your dough is too weak because it’s too wet, you’ll still often get a good result. The excess liquid will just evaporate when you take the lid off the pan.’
If you’d like to receive the most delicious recipes by email, register for our newsletter ‘Inspiration Today’ and add more flavour to your inbox. That’s all you have to do to receive the latest news about events, recipes especially for your EGG, practical tips and much, much more!
Let yourself be inspired and learn to do more with your Big Green Egg! Submerge yourself in a world full of culinary possibilities. Ask your questions and share your experiences via Facebook (eu) and Instagram (eu). Tag @eu, use the hashtags #TheEvergreen and #forevergreen and get featured! We create beautiful memories. Are you in?A couple years ago I talked about my experience with baking bread in an outdoor grill. One solution to baking yourself out of your own home during the hot summer months. Recently, reader Marianne Preston posted a photo of her success using a Big Green Egg to accomplish the same thing. Since the bread looked so good, I asked her if she wouldn’t mind elaborating on how she did it. Read her account below.
Big Green Egg Naan Flatbread Recipe
My bread baking experiment in the Big Green Egg was only my 4th attempt at using the Egg. We had just bought it the previous week. It’s is pretty easy to regulate the temperature in the Egg once the Egg’s ceramic has had a chance to reach the appropriate cooking temperature. I’ve found that it’s best to start to close off the air entering the bottom damper door and the air going out the daisy wheel top as the cooker is approaching the correct temperature. It’s harder to reduce the temperature because the ceramic holds the heat so well. Even when you open the Egg to put in the bread or to remove the cloche, the temperature returns to baking temperatures within a couple of minutes (assuming the Egg is properly preheated)–without adjusting the damper door or the daisy wheel.
When baking in the Egg, it’s recommended that you use the Egg’s plate setter (http://www.biggreenegg.com/setters.html) or make your own version using firebrick. Here’s a link to the firebrick configuration:
The firebrick acts as an additional heat sink as well as a shield for the pizza stone which is placed on top of the brick. If you look closely at the picture I posted you might be able to see the way I had it set up.
Victoria's Banana Bread On The Big Green Egg
I was aiming for a temperature of about 500F. I made the mistake of increasing the airflow after I loaded the bread into the Egg and the temperature crept up to 550F. Should have left it alone. I used no-stick aluminum foil under the loaf (Alcan Slide) instead of parchment paper. After 20 minutes, I removed my terracotta pot as well as the foil and baked for an additional 15 minutes. I should point out that this was a recipe from Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day and was a smaller loaf than the ones you usually post on your site. I wanted to start “small”.
You can also bake some breads in the Cast Iron Dutch Oven or the Green Dutch Oven. Hiljo: ‘For larger breads and especially those with a weaker dough, baking the loaf in a cast iron pan in the Big Green Egg is ideal. The pan kind of serves as your baking tin, and supports the dough. That way, the dough has nowhere to go but up. The pan makes the Baking Stone unnecessary, because the heat radiated from the ceramic material heats up the cast iron in no time. My advice, when you’re baking bread in the Big Green Egg for the first time, would be to start by baking a bread in the pan. Not much can go wrong there, because of the shape of the pan. Even if your dough is too weak because it’s too wet, you’ll still often get a good result. The excess liquid will just evaporate when you take the lid off the pan.’
If you’d like to receive the most delicious recipes by email, register for our newsletter ‘Inspiration Today’ and add more flavour to your inbox. That’s all you have to do to receive the latest news about events, recipes especially for your EGG, practical tips and much, much more!
Let yourself be inspired and learn to do more with your Big Green Egg! Submerge yourself in a world full of culinary possibilities. Ask your questions and share your experiences via Facebook (eu) and Instagram (eu). Tag @eu, use the hashtags #TheEvergreen and #forevergreen and get featured! We create beautiful memories. Are you in?A couple years ago I talked about my experience with baking bread in an outdoor grill. One solution to baking yourself out of your own home during the hot summer months. Recently, reader Marianne Preston posted a photo of her success using a Big Green Egg to accomplish the same thing. Since the bread looked so good, I asked her if she wouldn’t mind elaborating on how she did it. Read her account below.
Big Green Egg Naan Flatbread Recipe
My bread baking experiment in the Big Green Egg was only my 4th attempt at using the Egg. We had just bought it the previous week. It’s is pretty easy to regulate the temperature in the Egg once the Egg’s ceramic has had a chance to reach the appropriate cooking temperature. I’ve found that it’s best to start to close off the air entering the bottom damper door and the air going out the daisy wheel top as the cooker is approaching the correct temperature. It’s harder to reduce the temperature because the ceramic holds the heat so well. Even when you open the Egg to put in the bread or to remove the cloche, the temperature returns to baking temperatures within a couple of minutes (assuming the Egg is properly preheated)–without adjusting the damper door or the daisy wheel.
When baking in the Egg, it’s recommended that you use the Egg’s plate setter (http://www.biggreenegg.com/setters.html) or make your own version using firebrick. Here’s a link to the firebrick configuration:
The firebrick acts as an additional heat sink as well as a shield for the pizza stone which is placed on top of the brick. If you look closely at the picture I posted you might be able to see the way I had it set up.
Victoria's Banana Bread On The Big Green Egg
I was aiming for a temperature of about 500F. I made the mistake of increasing the airflow after I loaded the bread into the Egg and the temperature crept up to 550F. Should have left it alone. I used no-stick aluminum foil under the loaf (Alcan Slide) instead of parchment paper. After 20 minutes, I removed my terracotta pot as well as the foil and baked for an additional 15 minutes. I should point out that this was a recipe from Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day and was a smaller loaf than the ones you usually post on your site. I wanted to start “small”.
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