Burned my sourdough crust twice, finally tried a Dutch oven preheat trick

I kept getting a burnt bottom and pale top on my loaves in my apartment oven in Chicago. Last Sunday I put the Dutch oven on the bottom rack for a full 40 minutes before loading the dough, and the crust came out even for once. Anyone else had to mess with rack position to fix uneven baking?

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sullivan.finley15d ago

Been there with the burnt bottom thing, it drove me nuts for months. My old apartment oven ran hot on the bottom coil so every loaf came out looking like a charcoal briquette on one side. What finally worked for me was stacking two sheet pans under the Dutch oven as a heat shield, plus moving it up one rack. Never tried the full 40 minute preheat on the pot itself though, that's a long wait but sounds like it paid off. The even crust is the whole point so whatever gets you there is fair game. Glad you cracked the code, uneven baking is the worst kind of frustrating because the bread still tastes fine, it just looks sad.

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