Thursday, October 18, 2012

Off-Grid Ingenuity - Toast on the Wood Cookstove


O.K., I'll admit it.  I'm a little slow.  For the past 15 years, I have been making toast in my wood cookstove oven.  Well, it can't really be classified as toast - more like razor sharp slabs of bread - but I call it toast, nonetheless.

The thing with wood cookstove toast is that by the time it is nicely browned, it is dried out, hard and brittle.  Eating wood cookstove toast is an explosive experience.  By an explosive experience, I mean that when you take a bite, your toast explodes into a million microscopic crumbs.  Due to the fact that I am an unapologetic toast lover, I overlooked the wood cookstove's toast deficit and assumed that I would eat dry, hard toast for the rest of my days.

And then I had a rather illuminating conversation with my mother.  We were waxing eloquent about the charms of our cookstoves and how pleased we were that the weather had turned, allowing us to fire off our beloved stoves.  We talked about all of the things we missed about our wood cookstoves during the hot summer months - things like putting food in the warming oven while we finished cooking so that everything was delivered to the table hot and always having warm plates (out of the warming oven) with which to set the table.  And then my mom said something that caught my attention - she said she missed browning hamburger buns on the top of the cookstove.  She opined that there was nothing as perfect as a bun, buttered and placed on a piece of aluminum foil to brown to perfection on her wood cookstove surface.

Really?  She has been toasting hamburger buns to perfection on the top of her stove for all these years while I have been eating toast that is roughly the same consistency as croutons?  Oh, the inhumanities!

Of course I had to put my new found knowledge to the test immediately!  I placed a piece of tinfoil (I assume you could use a thin cookie sheet also) over the medium/high setting (almost over the wood box) on my cookstove, placed three slices of bread on the foil and let the stove do its magic.  Almost immediately the toast began to brown.  I moved it around a bit (to make sure the bread was evenly browned) and turned it over a couple of times.  It only took a few minutes (rather than the 15 minutes, at least, that it takes in a hot oven) and, oh, my goodness, it was wonderful!  No more hard, dry, crumbly toast for me!  Now I can enjoy perfectly browned, yet tender, toast every morning with my tea, all because of my mothers Off-Grid Ingenuity!
Slices of bread placed on tinfoil over the wood box
Browning nicely!

15 comments:

  1. I don't have a wood stove... yet. Nor do I have a toaster, but toast is the ultimate comfort food to me, so "the mother of invention" taught me to brown it in an iron skillet. It works like a dream. However, although I know (because my husband is constantly reminding me) that iron skillets are indestructible, they can have their surfaces marred by cooking the wrong things the wrong way. For instance I always keep my 'egg skillet' set aside so that no one cooks something in it that will cause the eggs to stick. Well, oddly, toasting bread has a bad effect on the glassy finish of a good pan. I said all that to say this: THANK YOU and your mom for mentioning the foil! Next time I make toast I'm going to put foil in first. We learn something new every day! :)

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  2. Enola Gay,

    You had me laughing at this post. I can see you patiently waiting on that toast with a cup of tea or coffee. Then when you pull the toast butter and jam the toast, go to eat it and it's hard and crumbly. I bet since having that conversation with your Mom, you won't be making toast the old way. God Bless!
    Sandy, Oklahoma Transient

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  3. I love the idea of foil! I've made toast by putting the bread directly on the cookstove. Until it was toasted the bread would "stick" to the lid. (DH didn't like it so I didn't make it often).

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  4. I wonder if you could get a thin piece of flat, scrap stainless steel(or smallish cookie sheet), drill holes in the corner, add machine screws/springs/wingnuts and make an adjustable "toast plate"(adjust the space between the "toast plate" and stove) for making toast? Just a thought.

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  5. Isn't it crazy how things can be so simple and we can overlook them for years?!
    I recently was on Pinterest (biggest time sucker on the planet, but so much fun)and saw someone had this idea: we always have left over meat, beans, and cheese from taco night. I always mix it together, put it in the fridge, remind the kids to eat it over the next couple of days, then throw it out the next week. The idea was to heat up tortilla shells, spread the bean/meat/cheese mixture down the middle, roll the tortilla like a burrito, wrap in saran wrap and toss in the freezer. We used to buy a package or two of frozen burritos every grocery trip so the kids or parents could have them for snacks. Now we only have the homemade frozen burritos. We know just what is in them, no preservatives or other junk. I can the beans, we butcher our own meat, the cheese is still store bought. Can't believe it took me so many years to figure this out!

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    1. I can't even imagine throwing food away. Especially home grown and home butchered food.

      In my house growing up, 'leftovers' wouldn't exist more than a day. And if someone didn't want to eat something on their plate, they'd have it for lunch the next day.

      If the kids are the problem, and refuse to eat the leftovers, (as so many modern kids do) then they have too much. Maybe missing a meal or two is in order. They don't want it for dinner the next day? Guarantee they'll eat it for breakfast. Waste is a cardinal sin, if there ever was one.

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  6. Enola,

    (captaincrunch)

    Now I know I can do toast on a wood stove. One prolem solved!

    The next problem is cooking TV dinners on or in a wood stove????

    Any ideas, inquiring bachelors like myself are waiting to find out?



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    1. How about in one of those camp stoves you put over a fire? I guess this would only apply to dinners meant to be cooked in a conventional oven, and not microwave-only. Or a solar oven. Two jobs ago, I built a couple solar ovens(carboard, foil, old storm door), and it amazed me how well it worked. My grandmother had a thing she called a "cooking safe"-it was just a double walled wooden box insulated with sawdust(total cost to build-about two hours of my grandfather's time)-early in the morning, she would fire up the stove, get the food up to temperature, then put the pot/dish/covered pan in the box for a few hours-this was to keep from heating the house up so much in summer.Kinda like a slow cooker. You can do the same thing with rice and some stews in a large thermos-boil the water, mix everything, and let it simmer 'til lunch (a few hours) and it's ready...

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  7. Wow I'm learning so much.Will be getting a woodstove soon.What a great idea.

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  8. I was raised with only a wood cookstove for cooking and still have one. We always had a toaster which is for a wood stove. It consists of two wire racks with handles. The two racks are held together by two wire rings. You put your bread on one rack and close the other over it. Lay it on top of the stove. When the first side is done you turn the whole thing over and toast the other side - using the handles to open and turn, of course. You can sometimes find these toasters at antique or junk stores. I have two of them. One I've had for 40 + years and the other I got at a yard sale for $2.00. I enjoy reading your posts. Sylvia

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  9. Enola,
    May I ask you where you got your dishes? Or what company is stamped on the back? I love those dishes, so simple but elegant. They make everything you place on them look appealing. Even a slice of toast.

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    1. I don't mind you asking a bit. It may be a little difficult to find - it is restaurant ware from the 40's. It is made by Warwick and the pattern is "Adam". I found most of mine on Ebay, however, I acquired all of my cups and saucers on Craigslist. I did manage to buy my dinner plates from a restaurant that was going out of business, so I have enough for a lifetime-80! Hope that helps.

      Enola

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  10. Enola, Glad to hear that you finally can have "GOOD" toast now. Just sorry that it took so long. Back in 2008 we had to do without power for a week here because of hurricane damage, even though we are considered part of the Midwest. I used our Coleman camp stove to make breakfast each morning, and the wife was the one who suggested I try an old aluminum pie pan when I mentioned that I wished that I had one of the camp,toast makers that are sold in most sporting goods stores. Worked like a charm, and I filed this info away in my noggin for later use. LOL

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  11. I'm filing this in my 'awesome' category for later use. I don't have a wood cook stove, but when I do (or have a rocket mass heater surface to play with) this will be the first thing I make on it. :D

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  12. Brilliant! I haven't even attempted toast on my wood cookstove because I haven't been able to figure out how! I will definitely have to try this for tomorrow's breakfast.

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