I just made heart shaped cookies the other day. I use a marble rolling pin which I love and a Tupperware plastic mat to roll out the dough on (it is very old -- I don't know if they still make it). I like using the mat because I can put it in the sink and make sure it is really clean (I cannot put my granite counters in the sink and rinse them well). Anyhow, I always use this recipe from Taste of Home and they are THE BEST SUGAR COOKIES EVER! The secret that sets them apart is the 3 oz of cream cheese. You don't taste the cc in the recipe, but it makes them so yummy. I make the dough the night before and divide it into thirds to roll out. It is quite hard when right out of the refrig, so I let it sit for bit and then smash it down with my hands before rolling. A little flour when rolling out has never hurt these cookies. My other trick is, after rolling out the dough, use a thin metal spatula to unstick the dough from the mat before using the cookie cutters (metal is better, not plastic). Also, don't roll cookie dough too thin and only bake until you see a hint of brown on the edges or they will be crumbly. The end. Here is a link that might be useful: Sugar Cookies

Yummy! BBQ chicken pizza is one of our favorites too :-) We also like the crunch of cornmeal on our pizza crusts, but I use polenta on the peel to get that effect. For a while there I was using parchment paper under the crusts and just setting the crusts on the stone paper and all, but we missed the cornmeal flavor and crunch. I have a little whisk broom I use to dust the leftover cornmeal off of the stone so it doesn't burn if I'm baking more than one. I'll be curious to see what your experiment yields - I wouldn't think that replacing that small amount of flour with cornmeal would cause any problems. I have a batch of the dough in the freezer (the first time I've frozen it, as an experiment), and now I'm hungry for pizza so I guess I'll have to take it out and make some this weekend too. Maybe one BBQ chicken and one sausage and mushroom, just because I can LOL. Linda - I'm glad your pizza was a hit! Deniselie - I've never done a kitchen remodel, but we did do some hardwood floors in our last house which necessitated living in the family room with only a microwave and crockpot for a while, so I can only imagine what that must be like. I think I'd be daydreaming about the meals I'd make too... Becky

Did this oven come with a new house? Was it a gift? I'm asking because it seems like the kind of thing serious bakers buy after they've already done a lot of work with bread rather than those wanting to avoid working with dough. Maybe it was bought for some other reason? Regardless, don't be afraid of dough. People have been baking bread and adapting it to the tools and conditions at hand for centuries. You take some flour and water, add a little salt and maybe introduce some leavening or not, and you can make a seemingly endless variety of things all called bread. If the pioneers made bread, you can make bread. If my 19 yr old video binging, game playing college student is learning to make bread, you can do it. Now, that said, it can be confusing. There are different schools -- traditional techniques that are still needed to make sandwich loaves and enriched breads (brioche, challah and such). That's where folks like me learned to make bread, and I think those skills and the comfort level with working with dough still serve you well when working with other types of dough. But there are a lot of people who have been introduced to making bread through no-knead breaed techniques -- and boy, , are there a host of books to consult on that. Artisan Bread in 5 Minues a Day is possibly the most approachable to the average person. I made some good bread with their basic recipe -- my son loved the ciabbatta. But there are literally dozens more. A lot of the recipes use Dutch Ovens, Lodge multi cookers or some other covered method (I've seen folks use a clay pot or metal bowl upside down on a baking stone to capture steam from the bread and get much of the result your CSO will give -- often without buying anything new. The only store bought dough I've ever seen is frozen white bread (Rhodes?) or Sister somebody's dinner rolls. I know some pizza places will sell you the pizza dough, and some bakers have had success buying some starter from a bakery, but that's all I've ehard of. That frozen bread dough is the opposite of anything that you would want to take advantage of your CSO. It is soft white dough designed to be baked in a loaf pan or possibly divided into soft rolls. It will never be a crusty artisan loaf -- and it sound like that is what you want from the CSO. I have a Wolf convection oven without the steam. I would trust their recommendations (maybe they have a basic recipe?) as a starting point. I'd never used a convection roast cycle before -- had always preheated to a high heat to sear and then reduced the heat when we put in the meat. The convection roast preset is a lower temp, but a bit higher than we'd used. Since this was different, we tried the preset. Roasts a whole chicken in an hour or a little more, crispy skin and juicy inside with no fuss. Our turkeys have been so easy and so good -- I digress, but hope you get the point. Explore the options. You should be very happy. You might find Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day at your library (and it's on Amazon, including Kindle if not). I would suggest cecking that out and trying to work with what you already have before buying equipment (make half their recipe and you shoulf have something that will hold it without buying large bins or clearing a fridge to hold a 5 gallon drum). After trying it, you can see if you need to buy anything new. Very litle expense -- very little effort really, and you might decide you like woring with dough enough to try the old school stuff too. I like both.

Report card on last night's pizza experiment... I adopted and adapted much of the excellent advice from the generous people here, and to my taste, achieved a 90% result! First, turned on the oven to full bore before making the dough. Added around an extra cup of flour to my usual mix. (Who measures?) I think this made a big difference, as the finished pizza had a thicker base with some "chew", not crunch. Just threw the granular yeast into the flour, without proving it first. No oil. Added more water than I normally would. Got it to a consistency where it was sticky, without quite sticking to my fingers. Into a covered bowl. By now, the house was so hot that I went out and sat on the verandah, talking to the kangaroos while the dough was rising. An hour later, I just threw the beautifully risen dough onto the pan without a punch and 2nd kneading. No oil on pan. Spread onto the pan and added toppings. I only added minimal toppings, as in the past I've been guilty of overloading it, requiring longer cooking time. Grated the cheese on the fine side, rather than coarsely. Again, less time to cook. Still using top shelf of oven, put in empty 10" pan first, with 12" pizza directly on top of it. It's some insulation, no? Just 10 minutes later, time to eat, and it was wonderful! Bottom only slightly crisp, but properly cooked. Dough chewy but cooked through. I ate the entire thing in 10 minutes with a glass of nice shiraz, and toasted you all! (Paying for it today, though, as I think the 12 chillies were overkill.) So a big thank you from me to you!