Steam/No Steam; Fan/No Fan; Steam B/f vs Aft....THEORY only, disregard water, flour????

chueh said:

Thank you Silversage. Yes I had gone to her website before I started this thread, but I did not get any reply to my question.

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chueh said:

I've searched for the subjects quite a bit, by reading blogs/articles and watched videos about it.

I do understand the BASIC principles about using steam at the beginning of baking helping the oven spring and preventing the crust formed too quickly, such as sourdough boule or just basic artisan bread with steam for the 1st bake and finish up without to brown it. I just don't understand why steam would make crispy crust??? (Chinese steamed buns are all 100% steamed without dry air, Artisan bread crust gets crusty because of the DRY Baking on the second bake changed the jell molecule, right???

Nevertheless, I am very confused about most soft crust buns, rolls, or sandwich breads are baked WITHOUT steam at all!.

Chinese steam buns are steamed from the beginning to the end of the cooking process, and they are super soft in and out (I am hesitant to use the word "crust" for the outer skin of the steam buns, for they are NOT crusty at all). Having this concept, isn't it all the best to just using 100% steam while baking buns, rolls, and sandwiches? To me, it seems to be, for both my husband and I have weak teeth and prefer softer bread and crust. So...
Q1. Isn't it contradicting the idea to form the crust quicker with harder crust without steam???? Most of the soft crust bread are not baked with steam at all! I do understand that those baked without steam are baked with very short time. Is this WHY they don't use steam?


I focus only the "steam" and "temperature" from some recipes below to compare:

Shkupan sandwich 350F Steam N/A

Classic Sandwich 392F Steam 60% (1st bake)

392F Steam Off (2nd bake)

Challah from Babish 392 Steam 60%

360 Steam Off

Traditional Challah 350 Steam 60% bottom rack

350 Steam 60% top rack

Dinner Rolls 375 Steam 100%

375 Steam Off

Hamburger Buns 350 Steam 100%

Hot Cross Buns 325 Steam N/A



I understand that I cannot just look at the temperature and steam for comparisons but every recipe process and each ingredient affect the outcome. However, I picked those recipes with very similar processes and ingredients with similar percentage of ingredients and similar baking time. Anyway,

I just want to KNOW the THEORY behind the above examples. They all yield for SOFT crust.....

Q2. The only thing I can gather from various recipes is that the higher the baking temperature goes, more steam is needed, whereas the lower needs less steam or no steam. Is that right?

Almost always, if steam is called for, it's for the 1st bake. However, I saw also a grilled cheese sandwich recipe in oven, as well as toast recipes, starting out with dry bake and then steam later to get both crunchy and chewy texture.
Q3. what's the different result between steam 1st and then brown vs. bake dry 1st and then steam? They all seem to be the same result to me???? What's the theory behind steam 1st or later????? I would assume dry bake 1st and then steam would make the toast soggy, but nope. it's the same as steam 1st and then dry bake. Why would they be still crunchy with steam afterward to finish them off?

Convection helps air circulated better and shorten the baking time, BUT
Q4. If I want softest crust for any kind of bread, should I just leave the fan out? We all know that air dries things out!


Thank you in advance for your input

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gerardj said:

its probably simpler than you think.
I think you're missing the component that controls color, its the sugar content , sugar makes a loaf or bun brown quickly, you will tend to remove it from the oven when the color looks pleasing and it will be soft because it isn't baked very long or very hot.

French bread, with no added sugar, has to get its color from very high heat, initial steaming prevents it from become hard, crispy is not the same as hard in this case...hard crust is thick and tough.

all the examples you give have decent added sugar content, so they will all bake up softer, steam or no steam, convection or conventional.

hard rolls contain no sugar.

So knowing what controls the color you can look at any recipe and already know what sort of crust you will get.

You can get a harder crust from dough containing sugar but it might be very dark.

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