This post is slightly embarrassing in that it has taken me what, 18 months to figure out that using a couple of bricks inside the oven would make a difference to cooking.
I am kicking myself.
So here’s the problem: You’ve got this oven that generates a massive amount of heat (easily 600 degrees F measured from the centre side of the oven) and when you put in a pizza the edge nearest the fire burns really quickly so you have a small amount of time before you have to turn it. If the base of the oven isn’t hot enough then you will find your pizza sticks and this can vary from inconvenient to disastrous.
I’d read somewhere on Dingley Dell’s website (the oven manufacturers) that they recommend you pop a couple of bricks in the back to keep the wood in check. I hadn’t figured on what it would do to the cooking process. So I popped into B&Q the other Sunday to find some bricks and came away with a triple pack of terracotta air vent bricks – about £7.50 ish. They are almost half-height regular house bricks with holes in and my god… what a change!
What they do is allow you to build a fair bit of heat in the back of the oven without encroaching on your valuable cooking deck space. They also shield the intense heat from the fire’s edge so that you don’t burn the far side too quickly thus allowing the pizza to cook more evenly. This, to me at least, is a bloody revelation.
For the first time in ages we had proper charring of the underneath of the pizza (you’ll have to take my word for it, I didn’t take pictures as I was too busy marvelling at my new-found invention while simultaneously scoffing said pizza).
Brilliant… honestly, it made such a difference that if you haven’t done this in your pizza oven and you’re having the problem I mention above then you should go out and get some. 2 bricks, one oven – now there’s a story.
