General Baking Recommendations
•When cooking foods for the first time in your new oven, use recipe cooking times and temperatures as a guide.
•Use tested recipes from reliable sources.
•Preheat the oven only when necessary. For baked foods that rise and for richer browning, a preheated oven is better. Casseroles can be started in a cold oven. Preheating takes from 5 to 9 minutes; place food in oven after OVEN INDICATOR LIGHT cycles off.
•Arrange oven racks before turning on oven. Follow suggested rack posi- tions on page 25 and in the various baking charts.
•Allow about 1 to 11/2inches of space between the oven side walls
•When baking foods in more than one pan, place them on opposite corners of the rack. Stagger pans when baking on two racks so that one pan does not shield another unless shielding is intended. (See above photo.)
•To conserve energy, avoid frequent or prolonged door openings. At the end of cooking, turn oven off before removing food.
•Always test for aloneness (fingertip, toothpick, sides pulling away from pan). Do not rely on time or brownness as only indicators.
•Use good quality baking pans and the size recommended in the recipe.
•Dull, dark, enameled or glass pans will generally produce a brown, crisp crust. Shiny metal pans produce a light, golden crust.
•Frozen pies in shiny aluminum pans should be baked on a cookie sheet on rack 2 or be removed to a dull or glass pan.
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