Fire and Smoke

I had many goals upon coming to Bread & Butter this winter but one stands up above all others. To understand the wood fired oven: what it's made of, how it feels physically to load wood and and bread, light and manage the fire, integrate myself in the schedule, and to experience the bread that it bakes. Of all the things in the bakery this is the most foreign to me. Even if the flours are different, the scale is in pounds, the doughs are wet, and the mixer is a different model I have a basis in what gluten is and how to develop it, how to zero a scale, and how it shape. And yes, I know how ovens work. I understand what the heat does to the bread. But at Small World I just set the temperature, flip the On switch, and put my attention elsewhere. The convention oven (usually) doesn't need much baby sitting.

On my first day, I walked in to find a large pile of pine slab on the bakery floor that Adam had loaded in not too long ago. He pulled the oven doors out and began to explain how to load the wood in while tossing it into place. "Try to keep the largest pieces towards the front and center. The fire reaches the back corners last and if there are big pieces back there they burn slower and it takes longer to get the oven closed down. You can also toss them all the way back until the hit the wall and make sure the stay a few inches behind the second brick. Okay, do you want to load the rest of the wood?" Oh boy, do I! As I moved through the stack, I gave each piece a good look to decide where it should go: keeping the big pieces front and center and keeping the small piece evenly distributed around the sides. Once it was all in, we torn up some flour bags, stuffed them lightly under the front pieces of wood, and struck a match to it. "You can tell the pine really wants to burn" Adam remarked as the wood caught flame with impressive speed.

It wasn't long until much of the front had caught fire and beautiful orange flames ranged in a lively manner. Once they were going pretty good we put a half dozen loose bricks standing wide and upright in front of the oven to help control the air flow and put oven door back in. A special door with a hole and it's own sliding metal door was put in the center spot. This door reminded open for a little while as the fire got going.

Every now and again we'd check it. "See how the flames are lapping the reduction arch? They are moving up the flue, just pushing heat out. So we'll close the door down about half way and damp the flue down about half way to control the fire so it doesn't burn to quickly." Reduction arch, right. Flue, gotcha. Air flow, how's the moving again? Books? Yea, I have some reading to do. I could feel myself getting it slowly and surely, but knew that there were going to be a lot of subtleties to learn before I really got to know how this box of flame and stone worked and how to give it what it needed.

It was only on my third bake that Adam suggested that I man the oven firing solo with the goal of learning it more intimately (and so he could enjoy a temperate weather run and as well as the novelty of having someone who could complete bakery prep smoothly). It was a suggestion I accepted with slight nerves and a request for some steps to follow along the way: a lot of lapping flames and damping things down until closing up completely in 2 hours at the most. Okay, great, got it...I think..

As I spent the next hour or so peaking in at the flames and thinking about what do next (if anything?), I realized that I had not been thrown in the deep end of learning and experience like this in a long time. Maybe not since Luke and Eli left me alone with the bread for the first time 3 years ago. Enough though it was kinda scary I did my best to acknowledge that only lessons would come from this and that it was pretty unlikely that'd I do anything that would hurt the bake for the morning. Although I did wish that Adam has left behind some of that confidence he seemed to have in with because I was starting to feel a little uncertain. After about 2 hours are seeing flames coming under and up the reduction arch and closing the front door and damper gradually, I still wasn't sure if the oven was ready to close up. After talking it out with Behka, one of the other Bread and Butter employees, and juggling around the little I knew about the oven I figured "alright I'll close it and see what happens".

Immediately after closing the door and damper, a strong puff of smoke crept out from around the doors. Adam mentioned this might happen and that once or twice was probably fine. But it puffed again. And then again, sort off continuously this time. As the smell of wood smoke and uncertainty filled the room I decided to slide to the oven open to investigate. Where there was a strong fire a moment ago was darkness and small coals since the fire had just been completely choked of oxygen. Just as I was thinking "Shit, I killed it" a puff of smoke blast out directly in my face and the fire came back to life in a healthy raging manner. Well, maybe it's not ready to close up just yet...

I waited until the fire grew smaller and until I figured Adam wouldn't be too much longer to do any troubleshooting before closing it up and going home. It was very counterintuitive to walk away from a fire and it was definitely an afternoon that challenged my self-confidence and problem solving skills. I left waiting to hear how the oven was doing (turns out a made a small but very amendable mistake and the next day's bake went great) and appreciating the humbling experience of being tossed in the deep end of fire and smoke. I have a lot to learn. But each time we load and light wood in the beginning and eat the bread at the end of the bake I understand a little more and remember why I came.