It seems that some authors seem make a process very complex when it
is really a simple one and I believe this is often to make their book
unique rather than to convey necessary procedures. If the process you
use will give the desired results then, by all means, use it. My
personal preference is to combine the dry ingredients then add and
incorporate the liquid ingredients. I will combine eggs, oil, and
water to form an emulsion before adding to dry. As for oven preheat,
I routinely use a baking stone so a long (45-60 minute) preheat is
necessary to bring the 3/4 inch stone to temperature to properly
brown the bottom crust. Even if no stone is used preheating is
helpful to bring the oven walls to temperature which reduces the
temperature drop when inserting the loaves since the interior is
acting as a heat sink. Also, the oven uses an on/off cycle and is not
as energy consuming as one might think. If you check you will see the
elements are not on all the time. Also, the author may be using one
hour as a stylized rather than absolute number to insure adequate preheating.
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