Baking Basics: Is it Necessary to Preheat the Oven?

 Preheating the oven. How many times have you looked at a recipe and step one is preheat your oven?


 *Recipe source: Popovers from New York Times

 But is it really necessary?

The answer is yes... and no. As a general rule, it entirely depends on what you're making, your ingredients and what your goal is when baking.


 *photo source: Electrolux

First off, what are you making? If you are baking something, for example lasagne or a casserole, that is not going to rise in the oven it is absolutely not necessary to preheat the oven. You may need to bake it slightly longer without preheating the oven, but the oven doesn't really need to be hot before you place your dish into the oven.


 *photo source: which.co.uk

Second, your ingredients. A while back, I wrote a blog about the difference between single and double acting baking powder. And we learned that single acting baking powder can be just as effective as double acting... if the baking powder is added to the batter near the end of making it and immediately put into a preheated oven. In that case, it makes sense to preheat your oven. If a recipe contains baking soda as a leavening ingredient mixed with an acid of some sort, it would also make sense to preheat because the bubbles in baking powder and baking soda don't make bubbles forever. So, if it takes ages to heat up, the bubbles might no longer be created and your recipe may not rise. Another ingredient that needs a hot oven are, for example, a dough with a lot of butter in it like croissant dough. It won't rise properly if it's not at temperature.


 *photo source: Epicurious

Finally, what is your goal? Is your goal to conserve energy? Then definitely don't preheat your oven. If your goal is to have very fluffy cake, definitely do preheat your oven. I haven't mentioned yeast breads. If you want very thick, crispy crust, then you need to preheat your oven. If you don't care what the crust looks like, you don't need to preheat your oven.


 *photo source: cafeappliances.com

So, in general, it's not strictly necessary to preheat your oven for most recipes. There are only a few very specific kinds of recipes that it really makes a difference, and with those, if you don't care about them turning out perfect, then you don't strictly need to preheat your oven.


 Watch us talk about this topic on YouTube here: https://youtu.be/UzFhdF9vwqY
Schaut zu wie wir auf YouTube darüber reden hier: https://youtu.be/_ixcT0zsqcE

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