From ruining your brisket to the mistakes everyone makes with their fridge, frequently opening the door of any temperature-controlled appliance can wreck your food. But according to Vivian Villa, chef and product developer from Villa’s Kitchen, for bread in particular, opening your oven during certain stages of baking can destroy its flavor.
“The characteristics of a baked good [develop] in the first 20 minutes of baking,” Villa told Food Republic. “Opening the oven door [causes a] temp change [that] negatively impacts leavening.” The initial leavening of bread in the oven is often called “oven spring.” This phenomenon occurs when the carbon dioxide produced during proofing expands but is trapped by the gluten in the dough. It’s vital to get this step right while the exterior of the bread is still soft if you want the interior to stay fluffy and flavorful rather than dense.
If you open the oven during this crucial period, the vital heat won’t penetrate to the dough’s center, resulting in an uneven loaf. While the outer layers may be springy, the core won’t leaven to its full potential. Whether you’re smoking meats, baking bread, or even just broiling some melted cheese on tortilla chips, one simple phrase applies to all of them: “If you’re lookin, it ain’t cookin.”
Why you shouldn’t open the oven for other baked goods
While keeping the oven door shut is especially important for bread leavening, that doesn’t mean you should feel free to constantly peek in on other baked goods. “The rule for keeping the oven door closed applies to ALL baked goods,” Vivian Villa says, adding that “[a] steady oven temperature is necessary for even baking, crumb development[,] and rise.”
You can bake better muffins — and, in fact, better versions of any delicately moist baked good — by keeping the oven door shut. Checking too frequently to ensure they’re rising properly means you’ll have to add extra minutes to their total baking time. For muffins, this can dry out the tops while their interiors finish cooking. Keep in mind that every time you open the oven, all the hot air whooshes out, but your tins and baking sheets retain most of their heat. That means anything in direct contact with them continues cooking as if nothing happened, creating an uneven final product (and possibly burnt bottoms).
For something like croissants, the results can be even worse. Baked goods like these are extremely sensitive to temperature fluctuations. If the front of your oven is consistently cooler than the back due to frequent door opening, it completely throws off their rise. The sides of the croissant facing the warmer portion of the oven will open significantly more than those facing cooler temperatures.
