Peugeot Ceramic Baking Dish 14 Inch in Blue

Take this dish out of the freezer and put it straight into a preheated oven. Peugeot states its Appolia ceramic tolerates exactly that, with no resting period and no thermal shock, which is a claim almost nothing else on a dinner table can make.

• Freezer to hot oven No waiting for the dish to reach room temperature before it goes in.
• Half an hour of heat The maker puts heat retention at up to 30 minutes once the dish leaves the oven.
• Six to seven servings A 14 inch dish sized for a family meal rather than a side.

Why Thermal Shock Usually Wins

Ceramic cracks when one part of it expands faster than another, and the classic way to cause that is a sudden change from cold to hot. Most fired ceramics need to sit out first. Peugeot says this range does not, and the reason is the composition and the firing rather than any coating on the surface. For anybody who batch cooks and freezes, that removes an hour of waiting from every meal.

Thirty Minutes Off the Heat

The same thermal mass that lets ceramic take the change also lets it hold what it has absorbed. A dish that keeps food hot for half an hour after leaving the oven is a dish you can carry to the table before everyone has sat down, which is a different way of running a meal from plating at the last second. It also means the base stays hot longer than you expect, so it wants a trivet rather than a bare wooden table.

Handles and Nesting

The wide ridged handles are the part you notice on the second use rather than the first. A flat-sided dish has to be gripped by the rim through a cloth; a ridged handle gives a gloved hand somewhere positive to hold, which matters most when the dish is full and heavy. The range is also built in graduated sizes that nest, so a second Appolia dish sits inside this one rather than beside it.

Temperature, Cleaning and Size

How hot can the dish go? The maker rates it to 250 degrees Celsius, around 480 Fahrenheit, and down to minus 20 for the freezer. That covers roasting and gratins without approaching the limit.

Does baked-on food come off easily? The enamel is glazed and non-porous, so nothing soaks in. A soak in hot water lifts most of it, and the surface is rated to resist scratching from the abrasion that follows.

What fits in a 14 inch dish? A gratin or lasagne for six to seven, a tray of roast vegetables, or a whole chicken with room around it. Anything smaller spreads thin and dries at the edges.