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Welcome to the wonderful world of Dutch oven cooking!
This page is intended to provide the beginner with enough
information to be successful on their first attempt at cooking
outdoors with a camp style Dutch oven (the kind with legs under
them and a lid with a lip.)
A good piece of advice to beginners is to ignore what mom
always used to say about "not wasting food when there are hungry
people in China". If a first try doesn't work, learn from the
mistake, throw out the food, make the adjustments needed, and
try again. Practice a dish in private if you must before trying
it out on friends, but remember, the information in these pages
will give you all the basic knowledge you need to begin
successfully cooking all kinds of food in these wonderful black
pots on the first try.
It is
very easy for beginners to learn to cook with a Dutch Oven, and
it is certainly a lot of fun. They are great when camping, but
are also a lot of fun when cooking out at home. A good roast,
some baked beans and fresh yeast bread cooked with charcoal in
Dutch ovens is a wonderful treat....YUM!
When you become proficient
with Dutch ovens, there isn't anything you can't cook in one
Dutch ovens can be purchased
made from either cast iron or aluminum. Unless you are
backpacking, or need to use a Dutch oven where weight is a
problem, stick to cast iron ovens where at all possible. The
aluminum ovens do not distribute heat quite as well as cast
iron, they classically have hot spots in them, and you are more
likely to burn food in one than in a cast iron pot. The aluminum
ovens are typically ordered from catalogs, whereas the cast iron
ones are commonly available in sporting goods stores.
Dutch
Ovens come in a large range of sizes. a 10-inch oven is a
perfect size for two people. A family of four or five should
start with a 12-inch oven, and Boy Scout leaders should consider
buying a 14-inch oven (or two!). The size is the pot diameter
in inches, and the number is cast into the lid. A 10-inch oven
costs between $25 and $50, depending on where you buy it, and of
course, the larger ones are more expensive.
When
you purchase a new oven, ALWAYS inspect it closely in the store
before you pay for it. Pull the oven and lid out of the box for
close inspection. Check for cracks (casting defects are rare,
but sometimes happen) and check the fit of the lid. Lid fit is
important. The lid must sit flat on the bottom part without any
vertical rocking when you push down on different parts of the
rim. A flat contact is critical for the Dutch oven to function
properly (heat conduction from lid to side wall). In addition,
the lid should NOT fit too tightly in the sideways direction.
The lid should be able to slide back and forth sideways from
1/16 to 1/8 of an inch. If the fit sideways is too tight, future
build-up of seasoning will eventually make it stick closed
during a cooking session.
GETTING
STARTED COOKING
Find a level
dirt, concrete, or metal surface upon which you can place hot
charcoal. Light some charcoal. When the charcoal is well lit,
make a ring of it the size of your pot as described earlier.
Place the pot over the ring and adjust the charcoal as necessary
to line it up with the outside edge of the pot. Place the lid on
the pot and add the proper number of hot charcoal onto it. The
food to be cooked will either already be in the pot, or will be
placed in the pot after the pot warms up. Most recipes assume
starting with a cold pot. The first thing that you try to cook
in a Dutch Oven should be Easy Pull-Apart Bread! Use the
biscuits that are fresh dough in a round tube and are
refrigerated, (Usually 10 biscuits to a tube).
Buy
enough to fill the bottom of your oven tight as you lay the
biscuits in the roll on their sides in the bottom of the oven.
DO NOT pull the biscuits apart, just take them out of the
package in a roll and lay them in a circle on the bottom of your
oven. Usually for a 10" oven we can place 7 tubes of biscuits in
a single layer in the bottom of the oven. For a 12" oven we
frequently use 8 or 9 tubes. After the rolls of biscuits are in
the well oiled oven, place enough hot charcoal on the lid and
under the pot to get to temperature (see above). It will take
about 10 minutes for the pot to reach cooking temperature, and
about 20 - 25 more minutes to finish cooking the biscuits. Peek
at them frequently (once per minute) after they have been on the
coals for 20 minutes, but only remove the lid for 2 or 3 seconds
or you will lose the heat and they will take longer. The bread
is done when it is golden brown on top, and cooked through when
you gently separate the bread in the middle. I'll bet that it
will be golden brown on the bottom too and not burned. If you
try this once out camping on a crisp fall morning, and have some
butter and strawberry jam available, I guarantee that you will
be hooked into black pot cooking forever!
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