We have a wood cookstove arriving here in about a week - the long dreamed of cookstove :-). Does anyone have suggestions for a good book that would help with learning to cook on one, especially with tips on baking in the oven?

-- Terry - NW Ohio (aunt_tm@hotmail.com), September 24, 2003

Answers

Since we don't seem to have a space problem here I am going to post these links separately. The first one is a book by the Foxfire editors.

Appalachian Cookery

-- Little Bit Farm (littlebit@brightok.net), September 24, 2003.

This one is really good. Don't forget to look inside the book and check out the sample pages at Amazon. Incidently I personally recommend that you purchase these books from another bookseller than Amazon as I am distinctly unhappy with their promotion of a pedophilc man/boy love book.

-- Little Bit Farm (littlebit@brightok.net), September 24, 2003.

Sorry click on my name above. This book is Fannie Farmer's Cookbook from 1918. In the second chapter she discribes building a fire in the stove.

Fannie farmer Cookbook online 1918

-- Little Bit Farm (littlebit@brightok.net), September 24, 2003.

Did you ever get your stove Terry?

Little Bit Farm

-- Little Bit Farm (littlebit@brightok.net), October 06, 2003.

Terry.......I found an oven thermometer to be of great value when I was learning to bake in mine. They can tell you all sorts of stuff in books, but watching a thermometer and getting the feel for how much of a fire you need in the firebox etc. to achieve the oven temp you want is a real "hands on" learning experience. I hope you have a great time........I can hardly wait until we get an addition built so I can have mine back up and running. I can cook "on" the woodstove I have now, but it has no oven and I sorely miss that.

You will find that, with practice, you can cook anything on the wood cookstove that you ever did on any other stove. I loved mine for canning as I could put several canners on at the same time and be fixing a meal......something that is hard to do on my regular stove.

-- diane (gardiacaprines@yahoo.com), September 25, 2003.

Thank you for the links, LittleBit. The "Appalachian Cookery" looks very interesting and I'm glad you told me about what Amazon has been promoting. I don't believe I have ever ordered anything from them but my sons have, so I will let them know too. I'm going to check with our library to see if I can borrow a copy but this books looks like one I'll probably want to own.

Diane, you mentioned that being able to can and cook a meal on a wood cookstove, at the same time, is something that can't be done on a regular stove. Well, on my electric stove I can't even CAN very well - LOL. I've found it hard to keep the canner at an even heat for the whole processing time and the enamel on the stove has become discolored from the heat.

About how long did it take you to learn the "feel" of your oven, Diane? I will be using the stove daily for cooking (will be heating the house with it too). This is a new stove so the oven thermometer will be working. Have you seen a Margin Gem stove? That's the brand we purchased through Topeka Seed and Stove in Indiana. The owner there has been so helpful in giving us information for my husband to be able to reline the chimney himself and in getting all the parts ordered for us.

-- Terry - NW Ohio (aunt_tm@hotmail.com), September 25, 2003.

Terry, you will love your stove. We have used ours for 4 years now. I hate going back to the electric for the summer. I bought a book from Lehmans Hardware called woodstove cookery that has lots of basic advice. We installed our stove on a Tuesday and cooked Thanksgiving dinner on Thursday. They are easy to get used to. Every stove is different and you will have to play with yours to find the type of fire you want for baking or cooking. I have found that meats seem to cook faster and breads and cakes seem to cook slower. I have never burnt anything with my wood stove but burn everything when I go back to the electric. You will love your stove. Use all the same recipes you do now, you may just have to adjust cooking times some. Bread is the best out of the woodstove. If you have any more specific questions, just ask me. Have a ball with your stove. Joanie - NW Ohio

-- Joanie (ber-gust@prodigy.net), September 25, 2003.

Boy, you all are making me wish even more I had a wood cook stove! It is on my "definitely purchase list" as it is. I want one!

Little Bit Farm

-- Little Bit Farm (littlebit@brighterok.net), September 25, 2003.

Joanie, you have given me hope. We will have our stove in the beginning of October and I was wondering if I'd be able to cook a good Thanksgiving meal - LOL.

LittleBit, I have wanted a woodcookstove for as long as I can remember - sometime in my teens :-). Bread is the first thing I want to try baking in the oven because I have always heard that bread is so much better baked in one. I always make my husband an apple pie for his November birthday so practicing pies is on the list too :-).

-- Terry - NW Ohio (aunt_tm@hotmail.com), September 25, 2003.

Terry, your Thanksgiving will be wonderful. We do like bread so much better baked in a wood stove, It even rises better for me just from the heat in the kitchen. I have a great honey bread recipe from an Amish friend that I can share if you like. I cooks wonderful in a wood stove. What kind of stove are you buying? Joanie

-- Joanie (ber-gust@prodigy.net), September 27, 2003.

Ive always wanted to get a "bread cooker", a peice of pipe for your chimney, that has a door in it,, and its jsut large enough to bake a loaf of bread. The smoke doesnt touch the food,, but it does use take the heat. First time I saw it was on, SWISS FAMILY ROBINSON movie as a kid. Cant find one,, when I explain what I want,, at the chimney store,, Im told it can cause cold spots and such. ( Like I care about that),, still want one. So for now, Im making due with an old COLMAN oven, thta fits on a coleman stove. Works so far on my wood heater,, though I havnt treid bread yet.

-- Stan (sopal@net-pert.com), September 27, 2003.

Joanie, yes I would like to have your recipe, thanks. The stove we are buying is a Margin Gem. It looks a lot like the Heartland Oval stove only does not cost NEAR as much. They are made by Mennonites in Canada.

At some point in the life of our house :-), cabinets and such were added to the kitchen and there is no longer room for a wood cookstove. We are putting ours on the backside of the kitchen wall, which is the dining room. We were able to move our dining room table to one corner, put my treadle sewing machine in front of the big dining room window and after we set the stove up, will still have room to put in a rocking chair or two so we are calling it our "Great Room" - LOL. It isn't exactly as big as the Great Rooms I've seen, but it will do:). Our dining room is in the center of the house so the stove will be in the best location for using the heat from it.

-- Terry - NW Ohio (aunt_tm@hotmail.com), September 27, 2003.

We have found that the stove is the favorite part of the house in the winter and we have no room for chairs around it. Ours is in the kitchen where the table would be. We have a large entry right there into the dining room so people can sit down but most prefer to stand around the stove. Ours is a Kitchen Queen made by Amish in Marion Michigan. Much cheaper than some and works great.

Bread Makes 4 loaves 1 cup lukewarm water 2 TBS yeast (I have to use 4TBS here to get bread to rise, an amish trick) 2 TBS sugar Mix with a whisk and let sit until it starts to foam good, about 5 minutes

Add: 1 1/2 cup hot tap water 1 cup honey 3/4 cup oil 3 tsp salt Total of 9 to 9 1/2 cups bread flour Add about 8 cups of flour and then just keep adding the rest as needed while kneading.

Knead for about 5 minutes

Put in oil coated bowl, cover with wax paper and let rise about 1 hour.

Turn out, punch down, separate and roll out for loaf pans. (greased) Let rise until double.

bake at 325 for about 1 hour. Start checking about 35 minutes, sometimes it is done much sooner. I have never had any of this burn in my woodstove. It cooks beautifully.

To make dinner rolls, I just tear into small balls and put in greased muffin tins.

-- Joanie (ber-gust@prodigy.net), September 29, 2003.

Thank you for the bread recipe!

Our stove was suppose to arrive this week but when the truck driver arrived at the Canadian/US border, he was carrying too much weight. So....guess which stove was removed from the truck? - sigh. They told us the next truck will be coming at the end of the first week of October or the beginning of the second week. I think they are referring to next week as the first week in October.

My Mom, Aunt and a family friend are coming for a visit starting the 22. It doesn't look as if I am going to have much time to "practice" before the arrive :-).

-- Terry - NW Ohio (aunt_tm@hotmail.com), September 29, 2003.

Littlebit,

No we didn't get our stove yet:-(. When the truck got to the US/Canadian border, he was carrying too much weight. Our stove was the last one on so it's the one that was taken off. We were told to expect it by the end of this week or the beginning of next.

I was able to get a book from the library that was one of your suggestions. "Appalachian Cookery" is the one I found and it's been wonderful reading!

-- Terry - NW Ohio (aunt_tm@hotmail.com), October 07, 2003.

I am glad you are liking the book. I may try to find it myself.

Little Bit Farm

-- Little Bit Farm (littlebit@brighterok.net), October 07, 2003.

The stove arrived!! Bright and early last Wednesday morning, a young man and an older Amish man from Missouri, delivered it to our house in a horse trailer :-). They had picked up three in Detroit and delivered two to an Amish residence and then brought ours. They also helped my husband and oldest son to unload and bring it into the house where we wanted it to sit. The Amish man, Mr. Ropp, gave me a lot of hints for cooking on it. We were able to begin connecting it to the chimney on Saturday morning (we had company during the week) and were using it for heat by Saturday afternoon - even though it was fairly warm outside that day. Sunday morning I made bacon, eggs and biscuits without any trouble and have since made cookies, a cake, and steak in the oven. It is great to make coffee on top - smells so good and tastes even better :-). I make the coffee up the night before, set the pot on top of the water reservoir so the water warms up a bit and in the morning, after setting the pot on the plate over the woodbox, can have coffee perked quicker (at least it seems so) than a Mr. Coffee can make it. I am very surprised at how easy it is to use.

Can you tell we are enjoying it? Oh, and....we noticed how warm the wood floors are staying. We open the stair door a crack and it sends plenty of warm air upstairs too. This will be the first year our kitchen has ever been warm during the winter. Even though the stove is on the backside of the kitchen wall,in the dining room, that heat just flows right around the corner into the kitchen. I believe I'll leave the mudroom/laundry room door open all winter and heat it too.

Joanie, I'll be trying out your bread recipe this Thursday morning - can't wait. Tomorrow morning I am going to help a friend pack for moving so thought it would be the perfect time to put the stew pot on and let it set simmering until I get back to have lunch with my family.

We were surprised to find out that the manufacturer says the stove can be only 6" away from a "combustible" wall. State Farm states they want one no less than 12" from a "non-combustible" wall but told us the manufacter's guidelines overide theirs. We still put a concrete wall board between the stove back and the wall, anyway.

Can't wait for the cold and snow this year - LOL.

-- Terry - NW Ohio (aunt_tm@hotmail.com), October 28, 2003.

Jonie's bread recipe, in the post above, is great!! Thanks Joanie. I finally got to try it last week and it was a big hit. I'm using that recipe to make the rolls for Thanksgiving dinner. Tonight I substituted a little wheat germ and oatmeal for some of the flour and will find out later tonight, how it turns out :-).

-- Terry - NW Ohio (aunt_tm@hotmail.com), November 13, 2003.