Baking is a method of preparing food that uses dry heat, typically in an oven, but can also be done in hot ashes, or on hot stones. The most common baked item is bread, but many other types of foods can be baked.[1] Heat is gradually transferred "from the surface of cakes, cookies, and pieces of bread to their center, typically conducted at elevated temperatures surpassing 300°F. Dry heat cooking imparts a distinctive richness to foods through the processes of caramelization and surface browning. As heat travels through, it transforms batters and doughs into baked goods and more with a firm dry crust and a softer center.[2] Baking can be combined with grilling to produce a hybrid barbecue variant by using both methods simultaneously, or one after the other. Baking is related to barbecuing because the concept of the masonry oven is similar to that of a smoke pit.
Baking has traditionally been performed at home for day-to-day meals and in bakeries and restaurants for local consumption. When production was industrialized, baking was automated by machines in large factories. The art of baking remains a fundamental skill and is important for nutrition, as baked goods, especially bread, are a common and important food, both from an economic and cultural point of view. A person who prepares baked goods as a profession is called a baker.
All types of food can be baked, but some require special care and protection from direct heat. Various techniques have been developed to provide this protection.
In addition to bread, baking is used to prepare cakes, pastries, pies, tarts, quiches, cookies, scones, crackers, pretzels, and more. These popular items are known collectively as "baked goods," and are often sold at a bakery, which is a store that carries only baked goods, or at markets, grocery stores, farmers markets or through other venues.
Meat, including cured meats, such as ham can also be baked, but baking is usually reserved for meatloaf, smaller cuts of whole meats, or whole meats that contain stuffing or coating such as bread crumbs or buttermilkbatter. Some foods are surrounded with moisture during baking by placing a small amount of liquid (such as water or broth) in the bottom of a closed pan, and letting it steam up around the food. Roasting is a term synonymous with baking, but traditionally denotes the cooking of whole animals or major cuts through exposure to dry heat; for instance, one bakes chicken parts but roasts the whole bird. One can bake pork or lamb chops but roasts the whole loin or leg. There are many exceptions to this rule of the two terms. Baking and roasting otherwise involve the same range of cooking times and temperatures. Another form of baking is the method known as en croûte (French for "in crust", referring to a pastry crust), which protects the food from direct heat and seals the natural juices inside. Meat, poultry, game, fish or vegetables can be prepared by baking en croûte. Well-known examples include Beef Wellington, where the beef is encased in pastry before baking; pâté en croûte, where the terrine is encased in pastry before baking; and the Vietnamese variant, a meat-filled pastry called pâté chaud. The en croûte method also allows meat to be baked by burying it in the embers of a fire—a favorite method of cooking venison. Salt can also be used to make a protective crust that is not eaten. Another method of protecting food from the heat while it is baking is to cook it en papillote (French for "in parchment"). In this method, the food is covered by baking paper (or aluminum foil) to protect it while it is being baked. The cooked parcel of food is sometimes served unopened, allowing diners to discover the contents for themselves which adds an element of surprise.
Eggs can also be used in baking to produce savory or sweet dishes. In combination with dairy products especially cheese, they are often prepared as a dessert. For example, although a baked custard can be made using starch (in the form of flour, cornflour, arrowroot, or potato flour), the flavor of the dish is much more delicate if eggs are used as the thickening agent. Baked custards, such as crème caramel, are among the items that need protection from an oven's direct heat, and the bain-marie method serves this purpose. The cooking container is half-submerged in water in another, larger one so that the heat in the oven is more gently applied during the baking process. Baking a successful soufflé requires that the baking process be carefully controlled. The oven temperature must be absolutely even and the oven space must not be shared with another dish. These factors, along with the theatrical effect of an air-filled dessert, have given this baked food a reputation for being a culinary achievement. Similarly, a good baking technique (and a good oven) are also needed to create a baked Alaska because of the difficulty of baking hot meringue and cold ice cream at the same time.
An Egyptian funerary model of a bakery and brewery (11th dynasty, circa 2009–1998 BC)
The earliest known form of baking occurred when humans took wild grass grains, soaked them in water, and mashed the mixture into a kind of broth-like paste.[3] The paste was cooked by pouring it onto a flat, hot rock, resulting in a bread-like substance. Later, as humans mastered fire, they roasted the paste on hot embers, making bread-making more convenient as it could be done whenever fire was created. According to Britannica, the Ancient Egyptians invented the first ovens.[4] They also baked bread using yeast, which they had previously been using to brew beer.[5] By 2600 BCE, they were making bread in ways similar in principle to those of today.[4] The book Bread for the Wilderness states that "Ovens and worktables have been discovered in archaeological digs from Turkey (Hacilar) to Palestine (Jericho (Tell es-Sultan)) and date back to 5600 BC."[6]
Baking flourished during the Roman Empire. Beginning around 300 BC, the pastry cook became an occupation for Romans (known as the pastillarium) and became a respected profession because pastries were considered decadent, and Romans loved festivity and celebration. Thus, pastries were often cooked especially for large banquets, and any pastry cook who could invent new types of tasty treats was highly prized. Around 1 AD, there were more than three hundred pastry chefs in Rome, and Cato wrote about how they created all sorts of diverse foods and flourished professionally and socially because of their creations. Cato speaks of an enormous number of breads including; libum (cakes made with flour and honey, often sacrificed to gods[7]), placenta (groats and cress),[8] spira (modern day flour pretzels), scibilata (tortes), savillum (sweet cake), and globus apherica (fritters). A great selection of these, with many different variations, different ingredients, and varied patterns, were often found at banquets and dining halls. The Romans baked bread in an oven with its own chimney, and had mills to grind grain into flour. A bakers' guild was established in 168 BC in Rome.[5]
Eventually, the Roman art of baking became known throughout Europe and eventually spread to eastern parts of Asia.[9] By the 13th century in London, commercial trading, including baking, had many regulations attached. In the case of food, they were designed to create a system "so there was little possibility of false measures, adulterated food or shoddy manufactures." There were by that time twenty regulations applying to bakers alone, including that every baker had to have "the impression of his seal" upon bread.[10]
Beginning in the 19th century, alternative leavening agents became more common, such as baking soda.[5] Bakers often baked goods at home and then sold them in the streets. This scene was so common that Rembrandt, among others, painted a pastry chef selling pancakes in the streets of Germany, with children clamoring for a sample. In London, pastry chefs sold their goods from handcarts. This developed into a delivery system of baked goods to households and greatly increased demand as a result. In Paris, the first open-air café of baked goods was developed, and baking became an established art throughout the entire world.[11]
Every family used to prepare the bread for its own consumption, the trade of baking, not having yet taken shape. Mrs Beeton (1861)[12]
Baking eventually developed into a commercial industry using automated machinery which enabled more goods to be produced for widespread distribution. In the United States, the baking industry "was built on marketing methods used during feudal times and production techniques developed by the Romans."[13] Some makers of snacks such as potato chips or crisps have produced baked versions of their snack products as an alternative to the usual cooking method of deep frying in an attempt to reduce their calorie or fat content. Baking has opened up doors to businesses such as cake shops and factories where the baking process is done with larger amounts in large, open furnaces.[citation needed]
The aroma and texture of baked goods as they come out of the oven are strongly appealing but is a quality that is quickly lost. Since the flavour and appeal largely depend on freshness, commercial producers have to compensate by using food additives as well as imaginative labeling. As more and more baked goods are purchased from commercial suppliers, producers try to capture that original appeal by adding the label "home-baked." Such attempts seek to make an emotional link to the remembered freshness of baked goods as well as to attach positive associations the purchaser has with the idea of "home" to the bought product. Freshness is such an important quality that restaurants, although they are commercial (and not domestic) preparers of food, bake their own products. For example, scones at The Ritz London Hotel "are not baked until early afternoon on the day they are to be served, to make sure they are as fresh as possible."[14]
Equipment
Baking needs an enclosed space for heating – typically in an oven. Formerly, primitive clay ovens were in use. The fuel can be supplied by wood, coal, gas, or electricity. Adding and removing items from an oven may be done by hand with an oven mitt or by a peel, a long handled tool specifically used for that purpose.
Many commercial ovens are equipped with two heating elements: one for baking, using convection and thermal conduction to heat the food, and one for broiling or grilling, heating mainly by radiation. Another piece of equipment still used for baking is the Dutch oven. "Also called a bake kettle, bastable, bread oven, fire pan, bake oven kail pot, tin kitchen, roasting kitchen, doufeu (French: "gentle fire") or feu de compagne (French: "country oven") [it] originally replaced the cooking jack as the latest fireside cooking technology," combining "the convenience of pot-oven and hangover oven."[15]
Asian cultures have adopted steam baskets to produce the effect of baking while reducing the amount of fat needed.[16]
Other equipment/tools needed for baking precision include a method for measuring ingredients. Ideally, a scale accurate to the gram is used, as exact measurements provide the best results, but some bakers rely on measuring cups and measuring spoons.[17][18]
Digital kitchen scales are also popular in baking where precise measurements are a must for dry ingredients. [19] The tare function simplifies the process by allowing multiple ingredients to be measured in the same mixing bowl, resetting the scale to zero between each addition and eliminating the need for extra measuring tools.[20]
The dry heat of baking changes the form of starches in the food and causes its outer surfaces to brown, giving it an attractive appearance and taste. The browning is caused by the caramelization of sugars and the Maillard reaction. Maillard browning occurs when "sugars break down in the presence of proteins. Because foods contain many different types of sugars and proteins, Maillard browning contributes to the flavour of a wide range of foods, including nuts, roast beef, and baked bread."[23] The moisture is never entirely "sealed in"; over time, an item being baked will become dry. This is often an advantage, especially in situations where drying is the desired outcome, like drying herbs or roasting certain types of vegetables.
The baking process does not require any fat to be used to cook in an oven. When baking, consideration must be given to the amount of fat that is contained in the food item. Higher levels of fat such as margarine, butter, lard, or vegetable shortening will cause an item to spread out during the baking process.
With the passage of time, breads harden and become stale. This is not primarily due to moisture being lost from the baked products, but more a reorganization of the way in which the water and starch are associated over time. This process is similar to recrystallization and is promoted by storage at cool temperatures, such as in a domestic refrigerator or freezer.
Baking, especially of bread, holds special significance for many cultures. It is such a fundamental part of everyday food consumption that the children's nursery rhymePat-a-cake, pat-a-cake, baker's man takes baking as its subject. Baked goods are normally served at all kinds of parties and special attention is given to their quality at formal events. They are also one of the main components of a tea party, including at nursery teas and high teas, a tradition which started in Victorian Britain, reportedly when Anna Russell, Duchess of Bedford "grew tired of the sinking feeling which afflicted her every afternoon round 4 o'clock... In 1840, she plucked up courage and asked for a tray of tea, bread and butter, and cake to be brought to her room. Once she had formed the habit she found she could not break it, so spread it among her friends instead. As the century progressed, afternoon tea became increasingly elaborate."[24]
The Benedictine Sisters of the Benedictine Monastery of Caltanissetta baked a pastry called Crocetta of Caltanissetta (Cross of Caltanissetta). They used to be prepared for the Holy Crucifix festivity. The monastery was situated next to the Church of the Holy Cross, from which these sweet pastries take the name.
For Jews, matzo is a baked product of considerable religious and ritual significance. Baked matzah bread can be ground up and used in other dishes, such as gefilte fish, and baked again. For Christians, bread has to be baked to be used as an essential component of the sacrament of the Eucharist. In the Eastern Christian tradition, baked bread in the form of birds is given to children to carry to the fields in a spring ceremony that celebrates the Forty Martyrs of Sebaste.[25]
Jesus defines himself as the “bread of life” (John 6:35). Divine “Grace” is called “bread of the strong” and preaching, religious teaching, the “bread of the word of God”. In Roman Catholicism, the piece of blessed wax encased in a reliquary is the “sacred bread”. In Hebrew, Bethlehem means "the house of bread", and Christians see in the fact that Jesus was born (before moving to Nazareth) in a city of that name, the significance of his sacrifice via the Eucharist. The Eucharist is often interpreted as a connection to the Holy Spirit, a symbol of God’s love, and an invitation to reflect that love in service to others, providing strength for living out one’s faith.[26]
See also
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Cooking, also known as cookery or professionally as the culinary arts, is the art, science and craft of using heat to make food more palatable, digestible, nutritious, or safe. Cooking techniques and ingredients vary widely, from grilling food over an open fire, to using electric stoves, to baking in various types of ovens, reflecting local conditions. Cooking is an aspect of all human societies and a cultural universal.
Dessert is a course that concludes a meal. The course consists of sweet foods, such as cake, biscuit, ice cream and possibly a beverage such as dessert wine and liqueur. Some cultures sweeten foods that are more commonly savory to create desserts. In some parts of the world there is no tradition of a dessert course to conclude a meal.
Flour is a powder made by grinding raw grains, roots, beans, nuts, or seeds. Flours are used to make many different foods. Cereal flour, particularly wheat flour, is the main ingredient of bread, which is a staple food for many cultures. Corn flour has been important in Mesoamerican cuisine since ancient times and remains a staple in the Americas. Rye flour is a constituent of bread in both Central Europe and Northern Europe.
Cake is a flour confection made from flour, sugar, and other ingredients and is usually baked. In their oldest forms, cakes were modifications of bread, but cakes now cover a wide range of preparations that can be simple or elaborate and which share features with desserts such as pastries, meringues, custards, and pies.
Pastry refers to a variety of doughs, as well as the sweet and savoury baked goods made from them. These goods are often called pastries as a synecdoche, and the dough may be accordingly called pastry dough for clarity. Sweetened pastries are often described as bakers' confectionery. Common pastry dishes include pies, tarts, quiches, croissants, and pasties.
Outdoor cooking is the preparation of food in the outdoors. A significant body of techniques and specialized equipment exists for it, traditionally associated with nomad in cultures such as the Berbers of North Africa, the Arab Bedouins, the Plains Indians, pioneers in North America, and indigenous tribes in South America. These methods have been refined in modern times for use during recreational outdoor pursuits, by campers and backpackers.
Dough is a thick, malleable, sometimes elastic paste made from grains or from leguminous or chestnut crops. Dough is typically made by mixing flour with a small amount of water or other liquid and sometimes includes yeast or other leavening agents, as well as ingredients such as fats or flavourings.
Quick bread is any bread leavened with a chemical leavening agent rather than a biological one like yeast or sourdough starter. An advantage of quick breads is their ability to be prepared quickly and reliably, without requiring the time-consuming skilled labor and the climate control needed for traditional yeast breads.
An earth oven, ground oven or cooking pit is one of the simplest and most ancient cooking structures. The earliest known earth oven was discovered in Central Europe and dated to 29,000 BC. At its most basic, an earth oven is a pit in the ground used to trap heat and bake, smoke, or steam food. Earth ovens have been used in many places and cultures in the past, and the presence of such cooking pits is a key sign of human settlement often sought by archaeologists. Earth ovens remain a common tool for cooking large quantities of food where no equipment is available. They have been used in various civilizations around the world and are still commonly found in the Pacific region to date.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to the preparation of food:
Afghan cuisine is influenced by Persian, Central Asian, and South Asian cuisines due to Afghanistan's close proximity and cultural ties. The cuisine is halal and mainly based on mutton, beef, poultry and fish with rice and Afghan bread. Accompanying these are common vegetables and dairy products, such as milk, yogurt, whey, and fresh and dried fruits such as apples, apricots, grapes, bananas, oranges, plums, pomegranates, sweet melons, and raisins. The diet of most Afghans revolves around rice-based dishes, while various forms of naan are consumed with most meals. Tea is generally consumed daily in large quantities, and is a major part of hospitality. The culinary specialties reflect the nation's ethnic and geographic diversity. The national dish of Afghanistan is Kabuli palaw, a rice dish cooked with raisins, carrots, nuts, and lamb or beef.
A great variety of cassava-based dishes are consumed in the regions where cassava is cultivated. Manihot esculenta is a woody shrub of the spurge family, Euphorbiaceae, native to South America, from Brazil, Paraguay and parts of the Andes.
This is a categorically organized list of foods. Food is any substance consumed to provide nutritional support for the body. It is produced either by plants, animals, or fungi, and contains essential nutrients, such as carbohydrates, fats, proteins, vitamins, and minerals. The substance is ingested by an organism and assimilated by the organism's cells in an effort to produce energy, maintain life, or stimulate growth.
A multicooker is an electric kitchen appliance for automated cooking using a timer. A typical multicooker is able to boil, simmer, bake, fry, deep fry, grill roast, stew, steam and brown food.
A spit cake is a European-styled cake made with layers of dough or batter deposited, one at a time, onto a tapered cylindrical rotating spit. The dough is baked by an open fire or a special oven, rotisserie-style. Generally, spit cakes are associated with celebrations such as weddings and Christmas. The spit can be dipped in a thin dough, or the dough can be poured or rolled on the spit.
Plum cake refers to a wide range of cakes usually made with dried fruits such as currants, raisins, sultanas, or prunes, and also sometimes with fresh fruits. There is a wide range of popular plum cakes and puddings. Since the meaning of the word "plum" has changed over time, many items referred to as plum cakes and popular in England since at least the eighteenth century have now become known as fruitcake. The English variety of plum cake also exists on the European mainland, but may vary in ingredients and consistency. British colonists and missionaries brought the dried fruit variety of cake with them, for example, in British India where it was served around the time of the Christmas holiday season. In America's Thirteen Colonies, where it became associated with elections, one version came to be called election cake.
A salt crust is a method of cooking by completely covering an ingredient such as fish, chicken or vegetables in salt before baking. The salt layer acts as insulation and helps cook the food in an even and gentle manner. After baking, the salt crust is cracked and discarded, revealing the moist and evenly cooked food.
↑ Figoni, Paula I. (2011). How Baking Works: Exploring the Fundamentals of Baking Science (3rded.). New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons. ISBN978-0-470-39813-5.p.38
↑ Kearns, Emily (1996). "cakes". In Hornblower, Simon; Spawforth, Antony (eds.). Oxford Classical Dictionary (3rded.). Oxford University Press. p.272. Cakes [...] were given many names in Greek and Latin, of which the most general were πέμματα, πόπανα, liba (sacrificial cakes), and placentae (from πλακοῦντες). [...] Most were regarded as a luxurious delicacy, to be eaten with fruit after the main course at a special meal. Cakes were also very commonly used in sacrifice, either as a peripheral accompaniment to the animal victim or as a bloodless sacrifice.
↑ Bessie Emrick Whitten (1990). David O. Whitten (ed.). Handbook of American Business History: Manufacturing. Connecticut: Greenwood Publishing Group. ISBN0-313-25198-3.p.53
↑ Simpson, Helen (1986). The London Ritz Book of Afternoon Tea - The Art & Pleasures of Taking Tea. London, UK: Angus & Robertson, Publishers. p.8. ISBN0-207-15415-5.
↑ Snodgrass, Mary Ellen (2004). Encyclopedia of Kitchen History. Taylor & Francis Books. p.330. ISBN0-203-31917-6.
↑ Simpson, Helen (1986). The London Ritz Book of Afternoon Tea: The Art & Pleasures of Making Tea. London: Angus & Robertson Publishers. p.16. ISBN0-207-15415-5.
↑ Stadulis, Janet K.; Lahiff, Maureen; Wiltse, Lydia; Assero, Nancy; Mannion, James-Patrick; Laughlin, Gabe; de Nolasco, Iliana; Engels, Aaron (July 2024). "What Does the Eucharist Mean to You?". U.S. Catholic. 89 (7): 33. ISSN0041-7548– via EBSCOhost.
Bibliography
Burnett, John. "The baking industry in the nineteenth century." Business History 5.2 (1963): 98-108. in Britain.
Figoni, Paula (2010). How Baking Works: Exploring the Fundamentals of Baking Science (3ed.). Wiley. ISBN978-0470392676.—a textbook on baking and setting up a bakery
Laudan, Rachel. Cuisine and empire: Cooking in world history (Univ of California Press, 2013) online.
Pasqualone, Antonella. "Traditional flat breads spread from the Fertile Crescent: Production process and history of baking systems." Journal of Ethnic Foods 5.1 (2018): 10-19. online
Zanoni, Bruno, C. Peri, and Sauro Pierucci. "A study of the bread-baking process. I: A phenomenological model." Journal of food engineering 19.4 (1993): 389-398.
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A Book of Nursery Rhymes/Part I Pat-a-cake, pat-a-cake, baker's man 1 - WW Denslow - Project Gutenberg etext 18546.jpg](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/09/Pat-a-cake%2C_pat-a-cake%2C_baker%27s_man_1_-_WW_Denslow_-_Project_Gutenberg_etext_18546.jpg/170px-Pat-a-cake%2C_pat-a-cake%2C_baker%27s_man_1_-_WW_Denslow_-_Project_Gutenberg_etext_18546.jpg)
