A New Batch of Bread

Yesterday, I fired up the oven by starting a fire about 1:30 in the afternoon. I kept it very hot and by 4:30 the temperature on the outside was 209 degrees. I raked out the coals and cleaned the floor. Marlene inserted the first of three loaves of her wild yeast bread. We sat back to wait for the results. This time I lined the wood door with aluminum foil to keep it from scorching the wood. By the way, with the fire removed, the outside wall temperature kept rising and reached 220 degrees.
Remember, this is all an experiment. When we pulled out the first loaf, the outside crust was a very uniform BLACK!! Oh well, in goes the second loaf.
The second loaf turned out very well. Nice heavy crust and done to perfection on the inside. You can see the comparison. Obviously, the oven was too hot the first time and was cooling down slowly for the second loaf. The outside wall temperature reamained above 210.
By the time the third loaf came out, the temperature was obviously just right. So, we learned a few things. Next time, after raking out the coals We will wait about a half an hour so the heat can soak through the whole mass of the oven before we insert the bread for baking.

After we finished with the bread, we put four potatoes in the oven for baking. An hour later we had nice baked potatoes with a medium crispy skin. When I took the final temperature reading at 9:00 PM the outside shell of the oven had dropped to 190 degrees and the floor of the oven measured 330 degrees. In order to take temperatures I have purchased an infrared thermometer from Radio Shack for $29. All I have to do is aim at a spot and push a button and it registers the temperature of the surface at which I'm pointed. This is really helpful with a basic oven like this.