Oven

Oven depicted in a painting by Millet

An oven is an enclosed compartment for heating, baking or drying. It is most commonly used in cooking and pottery. Two common kinds of modern ovens are gas ovens and electric ovens. Ovens used in pottery are also known as kilns.

History

Settlements across the Indus Valley Civilization were the first to have an oven within each mud-brick house by 3200 BC. [1]

Culinary historians credit the Greeks for developing bread baking into an art. Proper front-loaded bread ovens originated in Ancient Greece. The Greeks created a wide variety of doughs, loaf shapes and styles of serving bread with other foods. Baking developed as a trade and profession as bread increasingly was prepared outside of the family home by specially trained workers to be sold to the public.

The Greeks also pioneered sweetbreads, fritters, puddings, cheesecakes, pastries, and even wedding cakes. Often prepared in symbolic shapes, these products were originally served during special occasions and ceremonies. By 300 CE, the Greeks had developed over seventy different kinds of bread.

Types

Baking oven

Used for baking, domestically and industrially.

Burning oven

A burning oven has the primary purpose of combustion, several types of burning ovens for the purpose of disposal.

Examples

• A waste disposal facility utilizes active burner devices, because the waste is not always burning sufficient. For this reasons it is called burning facility in common language.
• BSE facilities utilize burning ovens.
• Crematories utilizes a burning oven for corpse processing.

Crystalizing oven

Used industrially for the purpose to grow a crystal from a molten substance

Domestic oven

Domestic ovens are usually combination models; capable of heating, cooking, baking and the traditional one's even of firing unwanted waste. This practice has become discouraged.

Drying oven

Used to de-hydrate goods, domestically and industrially.

Firing oven

Used to generate heat, domestically and industrially. The process utilized to generate heat within a coal power plant is called firing, the coal dust burns by a physical flame.

Heating oven

Used domestically to generate heat.

Electrical heating oven

Generates heat by the principe of electric resistance.

Melting oven

Used industrially to melt down metal ores

Processing oven

One of them operates by high-current eletricity, to clean iron ores of unwanted oxides. There are various types of processing ovens.

Roasting oven

Coffee beans undergo a roasting process; also some metal ores.

Cooking

In cooking, the conventional oven is a kitchen appliance and is used for roasting and heating. Food normally cooked in this manner includes meat, casseroles and baked goods such as bread, cake and other desserts.

In the past, cooking ovens were fueled by wood or coal. Modern ovens are fueled by gas or electricity. When an oven is contained in a complete stove, the burners on the top of the stove may use the same or different fuel than the oven.

Ovens usually can use a variety of methods to cook. The most common may be to heat the oven from below. This is commonly used for baking and roasting. The oven may also be able to heat from the top to provide broiling. In order to provide faster, more-even cooking, convection ovens use a small fan to blow hot air around the cooking chamber. An oven may also provide an integrated rotisserie.

Steam ovens introduce water (in the form of steam) into the cooking chamber. This can aid the formation of a crisp crust on baked goods and prevent the drying-out of fish and casseroles. The degree of humidity is usually selectable among at least several steps. Some steam ovens use water carried to the oven by the user in a container; others are permanently connected to the building plumbing.

The most-modern ovens may also provide combined thermal and microwave cooking. This can greatly speed the cooking of certain types of food while maintaining the traditional characteristics of oven cooking such as browning.

Ovens also vary in the way that they are controlled. The simplest ovens (for example, the AGA cooker) may not have any controls at all; the several ovens simply run continuously at various temperatures. More-conventional ovens have a simple thermostat: this both turns the oven on and off and selects the temperature at which it will operate. Set to the highest setting, this may also enable the broiler element. A timer may allow the oven to be turned on and off automatically at pre-set times. More-sophisticated ovens may have complex, computer-based controls allowing a wide variety of operating modes and special features including the use of a temperature probe to automatically shut the oven off when the food is completely cooked to the desired degree.

Some ovens provide various aids to cleaning. Continuous cleaning ovens have the oven chamber coated with a catalytic surface that helps break down (oxidize) food splatters and spills over time. Self cleaning ovens use pyrolytic decomposition (extreme heat) to oxidize dirt. Steam ovens may provide a wet-soak cycle to loosen dirt, allowing easier manual removal. In the absence of any special methods, chemical oven cleaners are sometimes used or just old-fashioned scrubbing.

See also

• clome oven
• convection oven
• dutch oven
• horno
• masonry oven
• microwave oven
• pit oven
• solar oven
• stove
• tandoor
• wood-fired oven

External links

• How Ovens Work Article by RepairClinic.com
• How Self Cleaning Ovens Work Article by HowStuffWorks.com