# Got to do it, wood oven fever



## Chef Niloc (Mar 16, 2012)

Can't help my self, wedding in Italy did me in I'm starting a wood fire oven tomorrow, picks to follow. Haveing one dilemma, brick or soapstone Hearth? Any of you have insight?


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## cnochef (Mar 16, 2012)

Good for you! We're landscaping our back yard this year and a wood-burning oven is the most important element of our plan. A local company is building it for us, with a brick hearth. We chose brick because from what I've read soapstone absorbs 3x the heat of brick and thus the oven burns much hotter. This may be better for pizza, but not as good for baking bread and roasting meats. So, it really depends on what the primary use of your wood oven will be...


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## tgraypots (Mar 16, 2012)

The key for most applications is keeping the ambient, reflective and floor temps the same. I built a simple dry stacked hard brick oven last summer, with soft brick insulators on the outside, with 28 x 42 kiln shelves on the floor and roof. Even though the insulation beneath and above is far beyond what most manufacturers consider adequate, the bottom is difficult to keep up with the ambient and reflective temp. Consequently, I now use a high-alumina kiln shelf raised about 2.5 inches above the floor, and everything is hunky-dory.


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## Chef Niloc (Mar 16, 2012)

Day one


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## Johnny.B.Good (Mar 16, 2012)

Congrats on the wedding Colin.

This will be a fun project to watch...


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## Crothcipt (Mar 16, 2012)

Congratulations on the wedding. Can't wait to see how this comes out.


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## Chef Niloc (Apr 6, 2012)

A little slow with the updates, here's the end of last week and this week


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## Crothcipt (Apr 10, 2012)

wow nice work can't wait to see how you will use this.


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## kalaeb (Apr 11, 2012)

Wow, you don't do anything half way. That is intense. Great work.


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## Deckhand (Apr 11, 2012)

That is really cool.


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## adletson (Apr 11, 2012)

Wow! Did you do all that yourself?


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## Chef Niloc (Apr 18, 2012)

adletson said:


> Wow! Did you do all that yourself?



No I don't have building skills like that 

But I did make this, the 1st pie






ChecK out the Leopard


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## Chef Niloc (Apr 18, 2012)

That was the 1st fire, last Friday


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## don (Apr 18, 2012)

Super cool.


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## knyfeknerd (Apr 18, 2012)

Looks great. How was the za?
What's next to be cooked (not pizza)???


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## stereo.pete (Apr 19, 2012)

Chef, that looks absolutely beastly, looks like things are going well at the restaurant, congrats!


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