August 23, 2011 - 4:28pm
Hello From Phoenix, AZ
I've been visiting this site for a while now and it's a fantastic resource for people who like to bake great bread and pizza. I grew up eating home made bread my mother made, and I started my own breadbaking and pizza obsession about 4 or 5 years ago, with particular emphasis on baking rustic hearth style artisan breads and last year I completed a Rado Hand style Wood Fired Oven in my back yard. I've also recently purchased a Komo Fidibus 21 Grain Mill, whick I love and I've been having great fun with that also. I've tried several of the recipes from this site, and am looking forward to learning more. Happy Baking Everyone!
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Hi breadbakin fool
i also live in phoenix, az. however, i'm not as advanced as you are in baking in the southwest.
i'm looking forward to learning from you about SW baking.
take care, claudia
I'm not sure I'm all that advanced, though I have managed a few successes, and this site is definitely helping. Speaking of southwest baking, I"ve noticed here in the desert that I often need to add more liquid than recipes call for in order to get the right results since it's so dry out here. I've even started using baking percentages to help, but even there, I still often add a higher percentage of liquid. I was wondering if you were doing the same? And thanks for the welcome!
Terry
i've noticed the need to add addt'l water or other liquid this summer. our heat has been horridly high but maybe baking in the a/c adds to the problem. it's even too hot to cook or bake bread on my gas grill outside
claudia
Welcome Phoenix Breadbakin' Fool,
You mentioned the Rado Oven. I am not familiar with it. Do you have more info to share?
This is a great site and I am glad you found it.
Cheers,
Anne
Frenchcreek Baker
I got the plans for my oven from Rado Hand. He lives in Australia and he has a website: http://www.traditionaloven.com/
His website is loaded with information about woodfired brick oven baking, and he'll send you a DVD with oven building plans for a pretty modest price of about $25 or $30 dollars, I can't remember exactly but I'm sure the info is on the website. The DVD he sent me contained about 1000 step by step photos of the oven building process.
His oven design is very similar to Alan Scott's barrel vault design if you are familiar with that, but it has a few design differences which I think make it a little better and more efficient. I built my oven pretty much along his design plan with a few slight modifications to increase and modernize the insulation materials and simplify the exterior decor, and I did the oven vault arch with a standard interlocking brick pattern rather than the simpified row pattern that he and Alan Scott use. It works great, and we're having lots of fun making pizza, bread, and just about anything else you might want to cook in an oven. I'd post a picture of my oven here, but I haven't had time to figure out how to do that yet. Anyway thanks for the welcome and feel free to ask if you have any other questions about wood fired ovens. I learned a lot building mine.
Terry