Breadmakers steam more than bake?
Ours doesn’t. It has a heating element which runs round the interior.
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How about baking bread in an air fryer?
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Can be done, but never tried because ours is the wrong shape.
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Was wondering if it might mean one less purchase or one more that multi purposes
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Just switching things up a little tonight.
100g flour, 8g salt and 325g boiling water for the scald. 100g water, 7g yeast, 25g rolled oats, then blend in the cooled scald until smooth-ish before adding 350g flour.
It’s at >94% hydration, but the dough is almost as strong as 70% without the scald. It’s presently on the final proof in a basket before it goes in the Dutch oven. I like 100% hydration bread like ciabatta, but the dough can be a little challenging to work with and the results more like a flatbread than a loaf.
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Well, it’s baked.
It didn’t rise as much as I’d hoped, probably due to the higher proportion of scald and especially hydration. It will be fine to eat I think, and it’s far from flat.
The crust is surprisingly soft, even straight from the oven.
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This morning I sliced the bread for sandwiches. While cooked through (I checked with a temperature probe last night) the crumb is very moist and slightly sticky in that Asian bun style and, despite being placed inverted into a hot iron Dutch oven, the bottom in the middle is slightly doughey.
For future loaves I’ll stick with the first recipe if doing a scald, this being a bit too sticky and moist.
Still looks yum though
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Thanks, it was actually really nice to eat, incredibly soft but with a nice flavour. The ring of poppy seeds on the outside and underneath didn’t do any harm either. 
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Mine today….
500 g flour (organic from Lozère)
5g yeast
9g salt
300ml warm water
15ml oil
Mix it in a bowl by a spoon until flour is absorbed. No need to knead. Place in covered bowel for 24hrs to ferment.
Next day, fold it a few times, and shape in bowel. Proof for an hour and bake 20mins lid on 20mins lid off in a cast iron pan at 220 Deg C (not fan oven).
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Which yeast? Impressed.
I trust that happened after the picture was taken. 
That looks really good Mikey. Out of interest, do you like those long-fermentation flavours, and is that a wholemeal flour?
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Not knocking the home bakers - we used to make sourdough in the UK , but no way could we now make bread at home that compares to that of any of our superb four local artisanal boulangers, who all make several varieties of pains au levain in wood-fired ovens. And each has a different style. Love it, but always difficult to choose what to stock up on.
However, over the years, I’ve come to realise that locally we seem to be much better off in this respect than many people elsewhere in France, yet it’s still surprising how few posts one sees on SF extolling the excellence of peoples’ local boulangeries.
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Because they are no longer worth extolling.
Nineteen years ago we had an excellent artisan boulangerie in town who made wonderful rye sourdough bread on the premises. It’s long gone. The is still a boulangerie there but it’s very functional. The local ones that have survived have gone over mainly to patisseries and lunchtime baguette “sandwiches” and pack meals for the local workers.
The artisan shops were killed within a matter of months when a brand new Lidl opened in town about 15 years ago and the shops couldn’t compete with Lidl’s bread and croissant prices.
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A few years ago my wife painted a series of diptychs that consisted of portraits of local artisanal bakers and their their best known loaves. Most of her subjects were surprisingly young and had come to the Aveyron from elsewhere, particularly northern cities. They’re part of a generational phenomenon known as les neo-Aveyronais - sometimes dreadlocked and heavily tattooed, but keen on connecting with the tradition whilst simultaneously innovating within it.
Our nearest boulanger has taught many of these new arrivals - he’s un guru du pain and when his shop opens at 4pm on Tuesdays and Thursdays there’s a huge variety of vehicles parked outside, including many trucks and vans of local artisans - unlike with UK hipsters, Eric’s pain au levain is a great social leveller, and for me one of the big differences between France and the UK.
On our way to Cussy we often pass through the small town of Chaource that has 2 bakers. One of them, we are told, does fabulous artisan bread. The other, we should not bother.
There’s nothing in the villages around here, and our village tabac/boulangerie buys in read-prepared dough for bread and croissants as of a couple of years ago, and the change in quality has really been obvious. The best local bread we’ve found so far comes from E Leclerc. 
Our local boulangerie, one of the two good ones, is for sale. Another closed recently. Another has opened another place 15 minutes away, but doesn’t look like it’s going well.
It’s blooming hard work.
We don’t use ours enough, so we’re to blame.
But yes, @DrMarkH , our local produces a variety of great bread and viennoiserie.
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Strange, in addition to the four artisan bakers that I mentioned above, all of whom have shops, there’s at least as many again, if not more who have stalls on our local markets.
Wonder why there’s such a difference?
Haha….but I guess it’s sorta true 