My Teigbehalter Was More Than Just A Pretty Piece Of Furniture

Everyone knows that teigbehalter is the German name for dough tray. But if you didn't know that, don't worry, most people who don't speak German didn't know it either.

Anyways, as you might have guessed, this post is going to be about the dough tray, variously: doughtrey. It was a piece of furniture for the kitchen, which was essentially a cupboard. A housewife would prepare her bread and/or pie dough on a table, and then she would lift the lid of the dough tray and place the dough inside it to rise. The dough tray provided for the dry, cool spot that dough required to rise properly. The dough tray pictured here dates from the 1860s to the 1920s. As you can see in the two photos below, the lid is not attached to the dough tray itself, but just sits on it and then is llifted off for access.

 
The dough tray, a large bowl-shaped form covered by a lid, developed from the dough bowl, which was simply a wooden bowl into which the dough would be placed, and then be covered by a piece of cloth, such as a dish towel.

The accompanying photo shows a wooden bowl sometimes used to hold dough when it was prepared for rising.