So I don't have a recipe or anything for you today. Or rather, I would, if I thought everyone out there had brick ovens in their backyards. Since I'm guessing most of you don't, I'm just going to be sharing a little of my experience today, and you can all be jealous of the fun I had. Aren't I the greatest?
A little background: one of my roommates, the one with more siblings than I can count (four hundred and thirty six I reckon), has a brother who recently completed construction of a full-sized brick oven in his backyard. And, even cooler than having a working forno, he regularly invites friends and family over to make use of the thing. So the other day we trekked over to his house and made brick-oven pizza, just because we could! Ok, it was one of the other sibling's birthday as well, but who's keeping track, right?
By the time we arrived, the fire was already blazing hot and near ready to go. Impressively, the forno regularly hits temperatures in the latter few hundreds, going so high as a thousand degrees if you let it. Yeah, you read that right: a thousand degrees. He also had the pizza dough waiting, so the first thing we had to do was divide it up into individual balls and they were ready to go.
Next, we worked on our toppings. We sliced up some fresh mozzarella and a few more non-traditional cheeses (like Gouda). We made a simple tomato sauce out of a can of crushed tomatoes, some fresh green basil, and a few garlic cloves. We chopped onions and peppers and a few different deli meats even, pulling everything out that could possibly go on a pizza. Oh, and a bag of sliced pepperoni, too. Because sometimes you have to go with the classics.
Then it was time to stretch out the dough. He has a few different peels, wide wooden paddles with long handles for moving the food around. The idea was to flour the peel and gently stretch the dough across it to create the crust. You had to constantly check that the dough would easily slide around on the peel, because if it stuck when you tried to slide it into the oven, you'd be left with a mess. Once that was done, you could top the crust with the sauce and meats and veggies and cheeses of your choice, to create whatever pizza your little heart so desired.
After that came the actual baking. First, we checked the fire with a laser thermometer. For those who don't know, it's exactly what it sounds like: a laser pointer that reads the temperature of whatever or wherever you direct it. I want one. Not 'cause, y'know, I really need it per se, but just because I want it. Then we simply slid the pizza inside. Picture it this way: a big dome where there's a blazing hot fire pushed to one side, with a spot left in the middle for the food. All in all, the whole process takes about, oh, two to three minutes per pizza. Don't believe me? Let's go to the video:
Ok, so my camerawork still needs a little, uh, work. But yeah, that fast.
Trust me, this pizza was delicious. I'll need to get his pizza dough recipe, because I want to find out if I can actually attempt to duplicate the magic in my plain old boring regular oven. I doubt it, though. The live fire adds a smokiness and an earthiness to the crust, but it bakes so fast that the dough doesn't have time to get dry and tough. The result: a warm velvety interior with a crunchy exterior. And the cheese melts so perfectly, it's practically a solid and a liquid at the same time. Even the toppings manage to crisp up, including the veggies. Since I don't care for raw veggies on my pizza, this is a big plus for me. All and all, as I said: delicious.
In the end, this was a very fun experience. I look forward to going back in the future to repeat the process. Sure, it takes a little more work than simply ordering delivery, but the process really is half the fun, and the results are more than worth the effort.
Join me next time when I'll have something I came up with from scratch! As always, I welcome comments and suggestions. Especially the suggestions; I need some new wacky ideas.
Until then, go forth and eat well.
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