Don’t yet grok my steam oven. At 400° and high humidity, can brown moist surfaces! How? Condensation > evaporation b/c high atmos. pressure?
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(My prior intuition had been that surfaces don’t brown in ovens until they’re dehydrated because water at the surface can’t pass 212°)
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the Maillard reaction (browning) can still happen in moist environments it just moves slower
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Right! It’s 400°F dry bulb for the PID, I assume… I wonder if that means it’s actually heating atmos. vapor to close to 400°.
Hm, right, this makes sense, temperature being a bulk phenomenon…
[the HbA1C reference is leading me down a very interesting Wikipedia-rathole; thank you!]
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OK, makes sense that it happens at lower °, but empirically: higher humidities in the steam oven make it happen *faster*. Why?
Vegetables! Have observed this effect with carrots, Brussels sprouts, spring onions.
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maillard. Surface temps of cooked item can be higher than surrounding. Higher moisture helps too.
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