A very humbling forum experience.

I took a break from building ukes this summer (well almost) and decided I wanted to build a wood fired pizza oven. I found some plans online and started to dig a hole. Then I cast a very big foundation slab of armed concrete, very hard work. The mixer I rented was small so I had to make about eight batches of concrete.

Once that was dry, or hardened at least, I built four transverse walls on it from cinder blocks. The slab wasn't level or square so the walls came out a bit wonky, and differed in height.

But I just continued at break neck speed. The next thing was to build a mould for a concrete slab spanning the four walls, and I had the chance to make that level. Loads of steel reinforcement bars, and again a complicated cast to make.

The top slab will then be the base for the igloo style pizza oven, a big barbecue grill and large worktops of reclaimed stone slabs.

But it looks like it was built by a madman! Wonky doesn't begin to describe it. I rendered the walls with mortar, and it looks like it was made by a drunken child two thousand years ago.


But what humbling forum experience, then? I found this forum for people who build pizza ovens, fornobravo.com I think it was. Went there way too late to learn stuff and to avoid mistakes. And was totally awe-struck by some of the "amateur" builds there. They looked super! And it was obvious that they let it take time, some of them had been at it for a year and it still wasn't finished. But square and even in height.

My only merit so far has been the speed. But I need to correct so many things. And I definitely need to do some homework before I start the actual oven.

I couldn't even bring myself to register in the forum! Never will I show my oven there. Maybe a pic of a pizza if I ever get one out of it, but it'll be a close-up so nobody sees the wonky slabs and the leaning walls.


This gave me a new perspective of the newbie posters on this forum and the mistakes they make. But if someone makes as many mistakes as I did building that 4x1.5 meter monster of concrete and stone, maybe they never register and tell us about it... I kinda hope that.

The main question is how does the pizza taste? Welcome back

Take comfort in the fact that you aren't some lazy-butt that never does anything but change tv channels. Maybe you can sort of stucco over the exterior to make it look more attractive.

Yup, it'll be covered in insulating material, then stuccoed. I think I might be able to tell you all about the pizza in... November. Barbecue for christmas, anyone?

I've read somewhere about roasting pine wood and then using it to make instruments. Apparently this crystallises the resin, or causes the music elves who live in the wood to hold hands more tightly, or something like that. Someone has to try this out, and you're our man!

Forget the pizza in November (in Sweden, forsooth - by then you'll want some kind of warming elk stew).

You took the challange on of making an oven...If you get great tasting pizza out of it, what does it matter how well it looks? Like you I would never post my beer brewing setup on any brewing fourms(There must be some), but the beer is fantastic and that's all that matters to me.

Ukulele making jigs and fixtures are another story though. Customers coming into the shop don't like to see rubberbands and duct tape holding things together!

I've built many large fire brick pottery kilns in my time. The best are built by amateurs, the worst, by professional masons. They may look like works of art but they don't perform as well as the more "organic" ones. Ovens need to breathe in order to work properly. I'm betting yours will work superbly.

I'll take a large pepperoni and mushroom to go please

For what it is worth two of the first items made in any new glassblowing shop I ever worked at were a "Kiln god" to watch over the new furnace and a "Witches Ball" to confound any wargs or Grumpkins in the vicinity. Since we never had any problems in the shops I can only assume they worked as intended. Seeing as how you are in Sweden, the home of some of the greatest glass works in the world you should have no problem with these accessories. BTW, none of us were professional builders. Enjoy the new oven.

I don't want to be a "party pooper"..but I can't understand why! someone would want to build a Pizza Ovan or a Bar-B-Q in the Garden or back yard when just 30ft away in the kitchen "under cover from the rain" is an expensive set up "already paid for" and runs on cheaper fuel than charcole.. that can bake, boil, fry, grill, roast, toast, almost any recipe that you can think of without nuking it.

Timbuck said:

I don't want to be a "party pooper"..but I can't understand why! someone would want to build a Pizza Ovan or a Bar-B-Q in the Garden or back yard when just 30ft away in the kitchen "under cover from the rain" is an expensive set up "already paid for" and runs on cheaper fuel than charcole.. that can bake, boil, fry, grill, roast, toast, almost any recipe that you can think of without nuking it.

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Ahhh, then I take it you've never had pizza from a wood fired oven then before.

Yup! Chuck I've had Pizza's from time to time from all sorts of Pizza places...I don't like em much.. I don't mind the Ham cheese & tomatoes peppers and stuff they put on top, it's just the bread thingy i dont like (To me it's like eating cardboard).... I prefer a good hot Chicken Curry with onions..or Fish and Chips with Mushy Peas, from my local Chippy ..I don't like Kebabs either...or Parmo's.
And here's another reason
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-19184803

Timbuck said:

I don't want to be a "party pooper"..but I can't understand why! someone would want to build a Pizza Ovan or a Bar-B-Q in the Garden or back yard when just 30ft away in the kitchen "under cover from the rain" is an expensive set up "already paid for" and runs on cheaper fuel than charcole.. that can bake, boil, fry, grill, roast, toast, almost any recipe that you can think of without nuking it.

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I can't answer for the OP, but our winters are so long here, that any moment spent inside a house, especially a hot kitchen in the summer is a dreadful thought. Up here, outside in the summer is for everything!

I don't have a pizza oven but I fire up the grill all year long! Nothing better than food cooked over an open fire. It brings out my inner caveman. I'd love to see photos of the pizza oven. I'm sure not a lot of readers here have one so I don't think you'd have to be ashamed of it. It's better than my pizza oven (because I don't even have one!)

I don't even have a stove inside the house. If it weren't for cooking outdoors I wouldn't be eating!

Timbuck said:

I don't want to be a "party pooper"..but I can't understand why! someone would want to build a Pizza Ovan or a Bar-B-Q in the Garden or back yard when just 30ft away in the kitchen "under cover from the rain" is an expensive set up "already paid for" and runs on cheaper fuel than charcole.. that can bake, boil, fry, grill, roast, toast, almost any recipe that you can think of without nuking it.

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My house isn't air conditioned. When it is 105 f, I am not cooking anything indoors!

The difference between a wood fired oven and a conventional oven is like the difference between a Custom built Uke and a mass produced one.

Sven, you must really love pizza.

I'll definitely post pics here, when it's done! I'm no manic pizza freak, the oven'll be good for baking bread and cooking steaks as well.

Ken, it's at my summer house which is like a small cabin with a miniscule kitchen. The guesthouse doesn't have a kitchen at all. So the plan is that 12-14 people can use the outdoor kitchen at the same time, cooking stuff at different ends. There might be a beer or two somewhere in the setup.

Timbuck said:

I don't want to be a "party pooper"..but I can't understand why! someone would want to build a Pizza Ovan or a Bar-B-Q in the Garden or back yard when just 30ft away in the kitchen "under cover from the rain" is an expensive set up "already paid for" and runs on cheaper fuel than charcole.. that can bake, boil, fry, grill, roast, toast, almost any recipe that you can think of without nuking it.

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I take it, Mrs. Timbuk does most of the cooking?