The Silly Mistake That's Making Your Popovers Turn Out Flat

If you haven't discovered the baked goodness that is a popover, it's time to whip out a few simple ingredients and crank up your oven. The beauty of a popover is a magic combination of its soft, puffy texture, against its crunchy exterior. But if your popovers turn out flat, it's probably because of one silly mistake: Not preheating your oven long enough. We asked Erin Jeanne McDowell, Kansas-city based baking pro and cookbook author, for the best tricks of the trade to prevent this crucial popover mistake. "Making sure your oven is really hot is the best tip," the expert baker told Tasting Table. "I'd recommend letting it stay preheated for at least 15 minutes before baking to ensure it will hold its temperature well."

You might be surprised that your blueberry lemon popover recipe doesn't contain any chemical leavening agents or yeast. To achieve their fluffy texture, popovers rely solely on high oven heat. In her parmesan chive popover recipe, McDowell explains, "Popovers are put into a very hot oven to achieve a strong oven spring, causing them to 'pop over' the edges of the pan." Indeed, the relatively high moisture-content of popover batter generates steam under hot oven temps, which solicits the bake's signature puffed rise. But if you don't preheat your oven properly, this steamy chemical interaction can't take place to its full capacity — and the resulting baked goods could very well turn out flat and dense.

How to ensure your oven is hot enough

Popovers aren't as forgiving with oven temperature discrepancies as pastries with chemical leavening agents, like muffins — so, preheating the oven is an important step. For good measure, you can use an oven thermometer placed inside the appliance to ensure your oven preheats properly and stays hot, since you can't always trust built-in oven thermometers and preheat indicators. 

Popovers come together quickly with a few ingredients — like flour, salt, eggs, and milk — so you can turn on the oven when you start making the batter, or beforehand. Use room temperature or slightly warmed eggs and milk, as cold ingredients can interfere with the steam-driven oven "pop" reaction. In her popover recipe, McDowell places batter in a popover pan and transfers it to the oven at 450 degrees Fahrenheit to bake for the first five minutes, before lowering the temperature slightly to 425 degrees for the remaining 18 to 20 minutes. Once the popovers are in the oven, don't open the oven door until they're done, to prevent steam and heat from escaping. Following this hot oven technique, your popovers should puff without a hitch. Since popovers are best fresh, just make sure to eat them warm out of the oven slathered with butter or jam.

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