Hearth Cooking: An Ancient Cooking Technique Revisited

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An Even Simpler Way

The hearth cooking method just described stains the hearth. The second method I describe makes no mess. And, in many ways, it is the best introduction to hearth cooking because it is so simple and elegant. This method works for fireplace or campfire, but not the barbecue. The same heat that warms your face as you sit in front of the fire will heat a pot of water. It’s that simple. Push a teapot within a couple inches of the fire to simmer water for tea. It will simmer on the side closest to the flames. Little in this world is more comforting than a cup of tea taken in the light of the fire on a cold stormy day — and when it is heated by that same fire you add a dimension of poetry to the cup of tea that makes it even more special.

Cooking by the fire’s light is silent. It is lyrical. It is as stress-free a cooking method as there can be. Its strength as a cooking method is in gently melding flavors. It might take all day, from morning until dinnertime, but it’s the preferred cooking method for stews, beans, soup stocks and many one-pot meals, such as the French poule au pot.

Start by placing the cooking pot filled with ingredients directly on the hearth a couple inches from the flames. Control heat by moving the pot closer to or farther from the fire. At your discretion, you can also speed things up by using the fireplace shovel or poker to push embers up against the side of the pot closest to the flames. When reheating a sauce, such as pasta sauce, I usually push the saucepan right up against the embers and stir, as needed, until it is hot. When you use this method to cook something that has lots of liquid, soup stock for example, stirring is rarely needed because of convection currents within the pot. Many dishes cooked by the fire’s light stir themselves.

Ember Cooking

The last method I describe is cooking directly on embers within the fireplace itself. This method is appropriate for the fireplace, the campfire and the barbecue. The most ancient griddle was a bed of embers, and it is on embers that the most distinctive flavors of the hearth are created. Ember-cooking is the opposite of slow cooking — working at 1,000 degrees Fahrenheit!

John 21:9 in the New Testament reads, “As soon as they were come to land, they saw a fire of coals there, and fish laid thereon, and bread.” Fish and bread can, indeed, be baked directly on embers. I do it all the time. Cooking on embers is a method that takes us back long before the Bible, to the first cooked meals. It is a rustic method — but it is a mistake to conflate rustic methods with unsophisticated flavors.

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