Elaine Boddy, a sourdough expert, asserts that preheating ovens is an unnecessary step in baking. She has not preheated her oven for over six years and has proven through experimentation that food bakes equally well in a cold oven. All recipes in her sourdough books utilize a cold start process, which includes various baked goods. Boddy claims this method yields better results, such as bigger and lighter loaves. She emphasizes that preheating offers no advantage, applicable to both gas and electric ovens.
All of the recipes in all four of my sourdough books have been baked from a cold start, which includes standard sourdough loaves, sandwich loaves, Bundt pan loaves, rolls, cakes, crackers and more.
I have two domestic ovens, side by side so I put one pan of dough into a preheated oven, and one in a cold oven, and compared the outcome. They both rose and baked well and the one that was baked from the cold start baked to a bigger lighter loaf than the one in the preheated oven.
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