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"These investigations suggested that large loaves made with water and flour might have been baked on these trays, placed in domed ovens for about two hours at an initial temperature of 420°C."

That's 788°F. You sure about that? And yes, the original paper cited uses the same value.

ETA on further review, it does seem to be in the correct range for baking bread in this manner.

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AdmiralAsshat 4 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Obviously Late Neolithic humans were just as obsessed with getting good oven spring as modern YouTube chefs are.

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some_random 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

It's way hotter than we'd deal with in an oven today, but a wood fire gets that hot easily

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giraffe_lady 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

It says initial temperature, and I think you'd want to be at coals not roaring flames at that point so they probably don't add any more fuel during the bake. It probably finishes at more like a "normal" modern bread baking temperature which is still 450ºf or higher.

And we're talking about a six pound loaf apparently which is just massive. I'm a pretty experienced bread baker, have done it professionally albeit briefly. My baker's intuition is that this would work.

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izietto 5 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

I share the same doubt. Also, I wonder how the scientists came up with the exact temperature :D

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michaelbuckbee 4 hours ago | parent [-]

In the original paper they made replica ovens and measured how hot they got:

"The parameters on which the trials were based were drawn from the results of a long-standing experimental activity previously conducted13,14. Solid doughs made from stone-ground organic flour mixed with other ingredients were baked in replicas of HTs. These were placed in dome-shaped ovens, similar to those found in the settlements where these types of vessels were discovered, at an initial temperature of 420 °C for about two hours. In the former case, the resulting products resembled large bread loaves, while in the latter case, the presence of lipid ingredients made the products softer and more flavorsome, akin to a sort of ‘focaccia’ type bread (Fig. 3a) (SI Appendix, Fig. S1)."

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tgv 4 hours ago | parent [-]

But that doesn't prove anything, does it?

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dleary 4 hours ago | parent | next [-]

It proves that they could have made bread this way.

It doesn’t necessarily prove that they did.

Although the article presents pretty convincing evidence that they did. (Ceramic formation on the clay trays that matches the temperature and composition of focaccia residue).

So unless they are just making up data for their paper (which is something that definitely happens), it sounds legit to me.

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michaelbuckbee 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Well, doing experimental history like this at least establishes the bounds. There are limits to how hot you can make an oven given the different fuel sources.

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Volundr 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Prove? No. Let's look at the quote we are discussing again

>"These investigations suggested that large loaves made with water and flour might have been baked on these trays, placed in domed ovens for about two hours at an initial temperature of 420°C."

That's why they are using words like "suggested" and "might". When dealing with ancient civilization often all we have leftover are tools that survived. It's not like we have cookbooks from that era. So all we have is guessing what they might have done, based on attempting to solve the same problem with the same tools.

	▲	cratermoon 3 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Even if we did have cookbooks from the era, they didn't have thermometers. We'd have things like Cai Xiang's Record of Tea. If you see tiny “shrimp eyes” in your water, he wrote, the water is roughly 155°F. If you see “crab eyes”—a slightly bigger bubble—then you’re reaching 175°F. Larger “fish eyes”: 185°F. String of pearls: 195°F to 205°F. And finally, when your hot water has reached a rolling boil, or a “raging torrent,” you know that your water is 212°F."