cast iron bake pot

This is a cast iron bake pot. As you can see, it looks exactly like an indoor dutch oven.

Because that's exactly what it is, with one notable exception: The bake pot, while the lid is not flat, it does have a distinct lip around the edge for holding coals in place.

Bake pots are sold in South Africa, where cooking outdoors in a potjie is very popular.

The main dish is cooked in the potjie, while the bread or dessert is cooked in the bake pot.

Potjies have a rounded bottom usually have legs; Bake pots have a flat bottom and usually have no legs.

Instead of putting the pot on a trivet over coals, as with traditional American dutch oven cooking, apparently they make a ring of coals around the pot.

The suggested baking technique is to grease the inside of the pot with butter or margarine, and put flour on top of the dough so it doesn't stick when rising.

A size 10 bake pot is 3 liters; Size 12, 5 liters; and Size 14, 9.5 liters.