Cooking too long, or too hot?
I have just moved into a new apartment, and am learning the ins and outs of this new oven. But being new to cooking/baking in general, I find that everything comes out burnt, one way or another. Cookies, frozen pizzas, etc.
I find that the bottom of everything I put in the oven winds up burnt to a crisp. The edges wind up overdone and burnt, basically, while the center tends to be slightly undercooked. I am trying to experiment with the times and temperatures, to get it right. However, being inexperienced, I am wondering if my oven just cooks hotter than the temperature I'm setting it to.
For instance, my cookie dough says to cook at 350 in a preheated oven for 10-11 minutes. Cooking to 10 minutes, the center is still undercooked, and the edges are nearly black. (The bottom tends to be all black)
Aside from the obvious "get a thermometer" response, does this seem to show signs of cooking too long (without preheating long enough), or cooking at too high of a temperature?
Best Answer
It's definitely a sign that the oven is cooking too hot somewhere; the under-done tops and middles are the give-away. I suspect your oven has a malfunctioning thermostat, which is quite common. Try setting temperatures 50 degrees below suggested, and see if it solves the problems. Failing this, purchase an oven thermometer to check it.
Another possibility is that there is poor airflow within the oven. In this case, hot air is heating the bottom of the pan, but cannot get around the edges of the pan to heat the top of the baked good. The solution to this is usually to use a smaller pan, and ensure only one pan at a time is loaded into the oven. My oven has problems of this nature when I try to bake in both racks with half sheet pans.
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What happens if the cooking temperature is too high?
Cooking food at high temperatures changes its chemical structure, producing toxic products called NFCs, such as trans-fatty acids (TFAs) and advanced glycation end-products (AGEs).What temperature is unhealthy for cooking?
Note: There are three important temperatures to remember when cooking meat or eggs at home: Eggs and all ground meats must be cooked to 160\xb0F; poultry and fowl to 165\xb0F; and fresh meat steaks, chops and roasts to 145\xb0F.What are the 3 types of cooking methods?
Cooking methods can be grouped into three categories:- Dry-heat methods, with or without fat. Dry-heat cooking methods like stir-frying, pan-frying, deep-frying, and saut\xe9ing rely on fats and oil to act as the cooking medium. ...
- Moist-heat methods. ...
- Methods using a combination of dry and moist heat.
What is the effect of too high temperature in baking?
As temperatures rise above 140\xbaF, eggs and gluten proteins begin to dry out, stiffen, and set, starch granules swell with water and gelatinize up until about 200\xbaF. Around 160\xbaF and above, enzymes are rendered inactive from the heat that destroys their native structure.Anthony Bourdain on the worst mistake when cooking steak
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Answer 2
I know you don't want to hear a "get a thermometer" answer, but you probably should. A poorly calibrated oven thermostat is a prime suspect. Using an oven thermometer, you can get a delta between your oven setting and the thermometer's readings.
The other likely cause is uneven heating in the oven. You can test this by placing the thermometer at different points in the oven.
The difficult challenge is then to remedy the situation. Some people use heat sinks to try to even out the heat in the oven. For example, you could put a pizza stone or some fire bricks (FIRE bricks, not regular bricks) on the rack above your food. Or you could put similar thermal mass between the heat source and your food in order to diffuse the radiant heat. Unfortunately, it will be a bit of trial and error before you settle in on your optimal solution.
Sources: Stack Exchange - This article follows the attribution requirements of Stack Exchange and is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.
Images: Foodie Factor, Eneida Nieves, Mareefe, cottonbro