The longhouses of the first settlers usually included a long fire in the center to warm the house. Around it, holes were dug in the floor to be used as earth ovens for baking bread and cooking meat. Women would place dough or meat in the hole along with hot embers from the fire, and cover it tightly for the time needed. They boiled liquids in wooden staved churns by putting hot stones from the fire directly into the liquid (a practice that continued to the modern age). Low stone hearths surrounded the fire, but mostly the cooking was done on the floor.