The new wave of ovens, which include Ooni and Roccbox, are quick to heat and cool, simple to use, and so portable you can take them to the park (assuming it’s ok). Mostly, they heat the stone base while sending flames licking the roof of the oven (don’t panic, it’s inside the oven, not outside) to cook pizza just like beehive fire ovens. Of wood.
The heat is supplied from a box burning firewood or charcoal, a gas burner (which means you will need a gas cylinder) or a pellet hopper. wood that can be refilled while cooking – the kind I have tested. You reach temperature in 15 minutes (in the case of the Ooni) or 20-30 minutes for the Roccbox, and the pizzas cook in minutes.
The advantage of the wood pellet type is that it is easier to store and transport. But you have to keep filling the hopper so that the fire does not go out on you (a full hopper lasts about 15 minutes, enough for several pizzas if they are ready) and I found that after a long cooking time that the Ash clogged the grate, stopping the flow of oxygen and killing the fire – although it springs back to life as soon as I push the grate in with a long metal skewer.
Other options include boxes set on a barbecue (which means you’ll have to start your barbecue first) – Lidl was selling one for under £ 40 earlier this summer – or metal ovens, complete with a stone. pizza placed above a combustion chamber. . Both lack that superior warmth.
Faragher gave me a masterclass in pizza making, even being polished with my dough which, unlike Bertha’s, was neither made with flour imported from Naples nor fermented for three days. It was good that my dough was stiffer than I was used to, he reassured me. “Everything about pizza is about water management, both in the dough and in the toppings,” he explained.
Too much water in the dough would mean it was scorched on the outside before it was baked, while lowering the temperature to allow it to cook would mean losing the puffy, swollen crust and heat set toppings.
Not that Faragher is too traditional, I noticed he coated a base with mashed peas, garlic and mint instead of tomato sauce. Topped with zucchini ribbons, she was tasting a summer pizza. “It’s all about the balance,” he said. Balance, and a very hot oven.
Bertha’s Pizza, The Old Gaol Stables, Cumberland Road, Bristol BS1 6WW (berthas.co.uk).
Ooni ovens start at £ 229 (fr.ooni.com)
From dough to dinner: how to shape, assemble and bake your pizza
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Source: www.telegraph.co.uk
This notice was published: 2021-08-11 13:01:25
