When making multiple things at once that require proofing, baking, and other multi-tasking, be aware of where your oven vents.

Every Sunday, I make my husband a loaf of sandwich bread. It’s super easy, and while it does take a couple of hours out of time, I enjoy it, plus it’s better for him in the long run. So I figured while I was doing this, I would make myself a loaf of bread—that beautiful, gluten-free white loaf—because it would take about the same amount of time and I could mix it in between proofing times of the sandwich bread. Plus, the gluten-free bread only requires one proof rise, whereas the sandwich bread requires two. Okay, so here’s the scene: the sandwich loaf is on it’s second proof, which means I’ve shaped it and it’s in the loaf pan. The gluten-free bread has already proofed and is now in the oven. While the oven starts at 425 degrees, the bread itself bakes at 400 degrees. I usually do not have anything in the oven, so I just have my bread on the stovetop, lightly covered with a clean flour sack towel, while it proofs.

Can you sense where this might be going?

So now my bread 1 (sandwich loaf) time is going off, its ready to go into the oven, but my oven is too hot, as it only bakes at 350. My gluten free loaf only has 10 minutes or so left – I figured I could gradually lower the temp. The other part of this story is I forgot to originally turn my oven down so it started the first 15 minutes at 425 degrees. oops. I get the oven to 375 and go to take uncover my sandwich bread. Cue the “oh no oh no” music.

As you can tell, there wasn’t too much damage. Where it was stuck to the towel, there was a bit of crust trying to develop, but overall, it did not affect the bread to much. So where my bread was proofing, there is also a vent. So needless to say, I will not be doing that again. Next time, I will find a better place for it to proof, if I am using the oven at the same time.

Are we not humans if we don’t make silly little mistakes? Luckily, my husband isn’t Paul Hollywood, and I’m not on bread week of the Great British Bake Off.