Thursday, August 18, 2016

How Much Can You Fit in a 48" Brick Oven

I can fit inside when I'm inspecting the dome!
One question that often comes up when talking with customers about the oven they want is QUANTITY of food.
"How much can I cook in it?"
"How many  pizzas?"
"How many loaves of bread?"

Okay.  Start with the fact that the ovens I build are well insulated.  That gives you cooking TIME.
The diameter of the oven floor is the space you will have for PRODUCT (what we usually call 'the food').
If you want to cook pizzas for instance, the oven temp will be near 700F, pretty hot; a thin crust pizza cooks in 90 seconds.  This means, unless you have four people making pizzas, by the time you get the third pizza in the oven, the first pizza is done (if you're fast and attentive).

I was recently (December 2016) in Eataly Boston.  The above was confirmed when the pizziaolo was able to turn out three pizzas at a time in their big oven with constant demand.

Loaves baked in my 36" oven at
The Kneading Conference
Bread?  A TBO 36" will bake three batches of eight loaves each batch (more if they are boules); a TBO 48" will bake 16-20 loaves.  This makes it feasible to bake 60 loaves before the temp changes enough to alter the type of bread baked from ones needing 550F to loaves that prefer 430F.


Pizza at the Fair in a TBO 48

A baker friend in Audrix France

The start of a really big oven



Tuesday, August 16, 2016

Restaurant Oven Test Firing

At the conclusion of each build, the oven needs a slow warm up to drive any remaining water from the masonry.  This takes about five hours (much longer than a common firing).  Instructions for this are outlined in the Operation Manual PDF posted on True Brick Ovens website. http://truebrickovens.com/operationmanual.pdf



About a month ago, Mike Mason and his crew at Loon's Haven Family Campground in Naples, Maine. www.loonshaven.com/ attended the test firing.   A few hours of 300-400F temps and the oven was ready to go up to 700F.  All good.

Thanks to all at Loon's Haven who helped

Wednesday, August 10, 2016

True Brick Ovens Trademarked (TM)

True Brick Ovens is now trademarked (TM) approved pending the long wait for processing.  
Why?  After nine years and dozens of ovens built from real fire brick with real mason skills, this small company decided to protect its name.

Although, as an artisan, I believe that security resides in a company's product.  But as Shakespeare said in R&J, 'What's in a name'.

So, aside from 'signing' my ovens with my handprint on the exterior of the dome, we are now trademarked.