Homestead mailing list

[Gene GeRue <genegerue AT ruralize.com>]

Yesterday I saw an oven like what we have been discussing. It was  
unique in that it was mounted on a trailer and it was covered with  
ceramic tiles about four inches square.

The man making pizzas had two young people making the skins, pitiful,  
thin, white flour things, another teen throwing on the toppings, and  
his young grandson cutting them with a wheel and taking the money. The  
man is chef and restaurant owner  Vincent Guerithaul who owns  
Vincent's restaurant on Camelback Road in Phoenix, a genius both in  
the kitchen and at the business desk. I suspect the reason he was  
personally making pizzas at his outside farmers market/Saturday brunch  
extravaganza is because he was making money faster there than at any  
of the other food stations. He had a temperature "gun" and showed me  
that at the back of the oven the temp was over 1,300 degrees. Just  
inside the domed opening it was 850 on the floor and 550 about six  
inches higher in the air. He said it took about two hours to get the  
oven fired and ready to go. Once he started making pizzas he never  
used the door.

I normally bake my thick pizzas, with pre-baked whole-wheat skins, at  
500 degrees for about 12 to 15 minutes on a pizza stone. Vincent was  
cranking out these thin things in two minutes flat, the bubbly dough  
and cheese visually delighting the customers. At seven dollars per  
puny little pizza he was making money at a rapid rate. He usually had  
two in the oven at a time. He was using those long pizza peels that  
are flat, thin metal shovels attached to a five-foot sturdy wood  
handle. He showed me how he turned the pizzas around at about forty  
seconds, so they did not burn on the side toward where the fire wood,  
red and smoking was pushed. There was a flu near the middle of the  
domed opening; the entrance dome was perhaps fourteen inches deep. I  
couldn't tell what the floor was made from, perhaps a custom fired  
tile. It was about a half inch thick.

He said that he bought the inside metal shell--it looked ash gray and  
bumpy inside--and had a tile guy mud it over and add the tiles. I put  
my hand on the tiles and they felt cool. A few inches inside it was  
over a thousand degrees.

The main reason I share this is because it occurred to me that a tile  
covering would be one way to make the outside waterproof, so our  
homemade clay ovens wouldn't melt if left out in the rain. That would  
allow full latitude on where we build ours and would obviate the need  
for a roof or tarp. The guy who tiled this one made it square. A domed  
shape would be so much prettier and would shed rain even better.

 I took a bunch of digital photos but someone needs to tell me how to  
get them onto a site where you can see them.
> From becida AT comcast.net  Sun Feb 17 13:45:02 2008
Return-Path: <becida AT comcast.net>
X-Original-To: homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org
Delivered-To: homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org
Received: by lists.ibiblio.org (Postfix, from userid 3002)
        id 4D3654C026; Sun, 17 Feb 2008 13:45:02 -0500 (EST)
X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.2.3 (2007-08-08) on malecky
X-Spam-Level: 
X-Spam-Status: No, score=0.0 required=5.0 tests=none autolearn=disabled
        version=3.2.3
Received: from QMTA07.westchester.pa.mail.comcast.net
        (qmta07.westchester.pa.mail.comcast.net [76.96.62.64])
        by lists.ibiblio.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 389F74C023
        for <homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org>; Sun, 17 Feb 2008 13:44:55 -0500 
(EST)
Received: from OMTA03.westchester.pa.mail.comcast.net ([76.96.62.27])
        by QMTA07.westchester.pa.mail.comcast.net with comcast
        id qfSm1Y02C0bG4ec570AF00; Sun, 17 Feb 2008 18:44:37 +0000
Received: from Family2.comcast.net ([24.18.90.152])
        by OMTA03.westchester.pa.mail.comcast.net with comcast
        id qikt1Y0063HDX1k3P00000; Sun, 17 Feb 2008 18:44:54 +0000
X-Authority-Analysis: v=1.0 c=1 a=vggBfdFIAAAA:8 a=wkj3dZ8WAAAA:8
        a=uyxBBIlvBkJsZtJEAUcA:9 a=vR0BlfGdEgr3jWt0wvQA:7
        a=i23ZgvKPuJvHmlvFgj--gQ7zYCwA:4 a=si9q_4b84H0A:10 a=JHGorsmrRLgA:10
        a=h9s5Ru71U4oA:10
X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Version 7.1.0.9
Date: Sun, 17 Feb 2008 10:44:10 -0800
To: homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org
From: Rob <becida AT comcast.net>
In-Reply-To: <04D0FE63-6880-4D56-9594-3D9B1BB5E09E AT ruralize.com>
References: <04D0FE63-6880-4D56-9594-3D9B1BB5E09E AT ruralize.com>
Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"; format=flowed
Message-Id: <20080217184455.389F74C023 AT lists.ibiblio.org>
Subject: Re: [Homestead] Outside pizza oven, tiled
X-BeenThere: homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org
X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.9
Precedence: list
Reply-To: homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org
List-Id: <homestead.lists.ibiblio.org>
List-Unsubscribe: <http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/listinfo/homestead>,
        <mailto:homestead-request AT lists.ibiblio.org?subject=unsubscribe>
List-Archive: <https://lists.ibiblio.org/sympa/arc/homestead>
List-Post: <mailto:homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org>
List-Help: <mailto:sympa AT lists.ibiblio.org?subject=HELP>
List-Subscribe: <http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/listinfo/homestead>,
        <mailto:homestead-request AT lists.ibiblio.org?subject=subscribe>
X-List-Received-Date: Sun, 17 Feb 2008 18:45:02 -0000

At  2/17/2008 10:30 AM,Gene GeRue wrote:
> Yesterday I saw an oven like what we have been discussing. It was
> unique in that it was mounted on a trailer and it was covered with
> ceramic tiles about four inches square.
>
> The man making pizzas had two young people making the skins, pitiful,
> thin, white flour things, another teen throwing on the toppings, and
> his young grandson cutting them with a wheel and taking the money.

I 'think' the thin crust, really hot oven is called a Napoli style 
pizza, like 2 or 3 min tops to cook it.
For the wood fired outdoor oven you really need to take a look at the 
book "The Bread Builders".
http://www.amazon.com/Bread-Builders-Hearth-Loaves-Masonry/dp/1890132055
Dan Wing (one of the two authors of the Bread Builders) has an oven 
on a trailer and had some good advice (somewhere) on building one of those.

Rob
becida AT comcast.net


> The
> man is chef and restaurant owner  Vincent Guerithaul who owns
> Vincent's restaurant on Camelback Road in Phoenix, a genius both in
> the kitchen and at the business desk. I suspect the reason he was
> personally making pizzas at his outside farmers market/Saturday brunch
> extravaganza is because he was making money faster there than at any
> of the other food stations. He had a temperature "gun" and showed me
> that at the back of the oven the temp was over 1,300 degrees. Just
> inside the domed opening it was 850 on the floor and 550 about six
> inches higher in the air. He said it took about two hours to get the
> oven fired and ready to go. Once he started making pizzas he never
> used the door.
>
> I normally bake my thick pizzas, with pre-baked whole-wheat skins, at
> 500 degrees for about 12 to 15 minutes on a pizza stone. Vincent was
> cranking out these thin things in two minutes flat, the bubbly dough
> and cheese visually delighting the customers. At seven dollars per
> puny little pizza he was making money at a rapid rate. He usually had
> two in the oven at a time. He was using those long pizza peels that
> are flat, thin metal shovels attached to a five-foot sturdy wood
> handle. He showed me how he turned the pizzas around at about forty
> seconds, so they did not burn on the side toward where the fire wood,
> red and smoking was pushed. There was a flu near the middle of the
> domed opening; the entrance dome was perhaps fourteen inches deep. I
> couldn't tell what the floor was made from, perhaps a custom fired
> tile. It was about a half inch thick.
>
> He said that he bought the inside metal shell--it looked ash gray and
> bumpy inside--and had a tile guy mud it over and add the tiles. I put
> my hand on the tiles and they felt cool. A few inches inside it was
> over a thousand degrees.
>
> The main reason I share this is because it occurred to me that a tile
> covering would be one way to make the outside waterproof, so our
> homemade clay ovens wouldn't melt if left out in the rain. That would
> allow full latitude on where we build ours and would obviate the need
> for a roof or tarp. The guy who tiled this one made it square. A domed
> shape would be so much prettier and would shed rain even better.
>
>   I took a bunch of digital photos but someone needs to tell me how to
> get them onto a site where you can see them.
> _______________________________________________
> Homestead list and subscription:
> http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/listinfo/homestead
> Change your homestead list member options:
> http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/options/homestead/becida%40comcast.net
> View the archives at:
> https://lists.ibiblio.org/sympa/arc/homestead