oven and put
the turkey breast in at 11 ayem sharp. Looking to have Thanksgiving
dinner
at around 230 peeyem. Not sure how it will turn out but the boat already
smells delicious.

My wife has made Thanksgiving dinners on our  boat several times.
The Force 10 does a great job in her experience.  Where it doesn't do
so well is in the "fail-safe" prime rib cooking method a friend
showed her years ago.  This process guarantees a perfect prime rib no
matter how large or small, but it depends on the oven being able to
hold heat for awhile after being turned off.  The Force 10 (and
perhaps every marine/RV type oven) doesn't have enough insulation to
hold the temperature the required amount after being turned off--- it
loses its heat fairly fast compared to a home/commercial oven.  So
she had to modify her method when we do a prime rib for Christmas on
the boat.  But the Force 10 does a lovely job on turkeys in our
experience.  Let us know how yours comes out.

C. Marin Faure
GB36-403 "La Perouse"
Bellingham, Washington

So

REPLY
Marin is right!  I have pulled apart and refurbished several RV/marine
stoves in my time.  BUT!..... as with marine fridges, it is possible to
add more insulation around the shell. CAUTION!  Stoves are the reverse of
fridges  and you must use glass wool insulation. Not to mention which oven
venting is essential. Finally  you should add reflextic  foil  as a
barrier  between the stove and  any cabinetry. This would be added
insurance of not heating up any combustible cabinet surfaces.

To me one of the most important aspects of oven cooking as opposed to
stove top cooking is the ability to brown and crisp the outside; be it a
pork roast, bird or pie and bread making. Sadly none of the toaster ovens
I have seen can cope with a medium size bird or larger.
What makes a heat element that is able to create crip brown outsides? It
is the amount of radiant infra-red emissions the heating element can
deliver.  This is why some of the toaster ovens now use the quartz tubes
on top for doing crisping.

Some micro-wave food portions are now packed with a "crisper" sheet of
foil on cardboard. The idea being, the foil will heat enough to re-radiate
enough infra red to brown the pie crust or pizza dough.

Nothing beats mass when it comes to great ovens. So how about adding mass
in the form of steel plate?  It will hold heat and to some extent
re-radiate it after the flame has been turned off to limit the temp rise.
A clean sheet of plate steel, properly seasoned would do wonders for
retaining heat. The Force 10 heat shield serves a similar purpose but
lacks mass. I envision a 1/8" or maybe thicker steel plate that rests on
the grill supports.
RV and marine stove makers are not expecting to cater to gourmet cooks
with their products. So there is little incentive for them to add expense
to the making of their products. However there are a few people out there
who do value real cooking ability, even if it is in an RV/marine type
product.
Definitely room for experimentation before the xmas turkey needs cooking.

For this christmas  my wife is going to make crab cake tartlets. She cooks
them in an oven like regular tarts but the h'ordeuve (tartlet) shells are
filled with her special crab meat filling.  MMMM!
It was a recipe she came up with for my birthday. Now it has become a
tradition. But it does ned a good oven.
We can get Alaska crab meat from fishing boats that unload at Prince
Rupert. Also king crab and dungeness crab.

Arild