Hi all I am moving to a new location feel free to come along
You will now find me at
Pizza oven
A very sad day in New Zealand and I’m not a hobbit but second dinner required
I would like to start this by sending out our condolences to the families that lost love ones yesterday in Ashburton, Jane know’s one of the dead ladies and when the name is announced she most likely knows the other, and wish the injured as speedy recovery. In Jane’s role she like many of her colleagues go to the office to met some of their clients on a regular basis, so she knows most of the staff there as she has been visiting for around 5 years. So as we sat down for dinner tonight we counted our blessings and our thoughts and prayers were for the families that are suffering.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11317243
So as for our day
Still drying out the pizza oven slowly seeing the render colour lighten and going fully firm, this not to say that the oven is not getting very hot now but the idea is slowly slowly wins in the end, so lots of excuses to make use of all that heat.
After all this testing think I might be developing pizza belly, time to give them a rest I feel, however on to dinner time and I made a Moroccan style casserole and pitta breads of course to use up the leftovers and heat from the drying process. So Jane placed the cast iron pot and oven proof glass lid in the oven.
This pot is by no means new but is well loved and been in the oven many times, however never in the pizza oven, our electric over tops out at about 230 degrees C. Well the pot went in the pizza oven the slab was reading 260 C and at the roof 775 C, I was off feeding the chickens and got a call from jane “You need to make another dinner” obviously I assumed she was mucking about but no the tempered glass oven proof lid had shattered due to the heat oh dear and dinner looked so nice.
We now know three things from cooking with a pizza oven
- Oven proof please ignore
- Baking trays will warp invest in more cast iron 🙂
- Always be flexible, smile, laugh and carry on
So off to the kitchen I went and produce the second dinner much modified. Oh the life of the house husband never ends 🙂 Dinner done now off to walk the dog, put a dozen banana muffins in the pizza oven put the door on and, came back for warm milk and muffins. 🙂
Pizzzzzzzza
Oh yes it works and I have the photos to prove it 🙂 Oh just put the one in of the local airport as we dropped off the hire car after Jane’s trip to Auckland.
Well it was an early start for a Sunday morning as we needed to light a long slow fire to finish the drying process but just way to excited to wait any longer, and to be fair you must wait. So we started with pizza the dough I made a day ago which was delicious. The first pizza went in and slide off the peel nicely, now a word to the wise pizza must slightly lift off the stone a little before you try to turn, if not it sticks and rips, oh and makes a mess 😦 So patience young padawan. The up side was the dog got the first pizza and it was lovely say the doggy.
Once the pizza was done in went the roast lamb for dinner all eaten outside as the last sun of winter set very nice. We then took out the coals and baked a loaf of bread followed by two trays of Anzac biscuits all from the stored heat from the fire, wonderful, finished off the process by putting the next lot of wood in to dry out with the last of the heat in the oven 5 hours after the fire went out it is still 90 degrees C in the oven so today has been a great day only would have been better if the other son Could have been home too, oh well can’t have everything, still life is rather good today 🙂
Mission possible
Well It’s done the oven is ready or should I say it’s ready for its first fire. If it was a lady it would be dressed but not ready to greet the world but still perfectly functional.
The final render coat was a comedy worth watch. It seems that you create like a candy coat that is not really connected to the oven so there is movement from the heating and cooling effects. Building up the thickness to the 5 cm required on an oiled surface was a challenge but seemed to be more about learning a technique which worked for me. I tried slap it on and watch it slip off, or drop it on and off all in one easy move. I settled for the smear and fear of failing technique, not saying this is the way to do it but it worked for me and happy with the results.
So tomorrow is fire time 🙂
Its official getting close now
Well with the wife at Uni in Auckland and I am unable to visit my son, so I knew what I was doing today. Yep Bob the builder again. So this being the second arch I have built its going to be easy for sure.
NO not quite wish I had a video as I found out it is possible to play with a slinky toy made of bricks and of course the tool required was just out of reach just for the comedy value you understand. However it has turned out ok and is supporting its self so all is well, only one stage left now till we can start the firing process and thats insulation/rendering and as of yet there is no decision on colour, ideas but no orders been given by Mrs clever clogs in Auckland 🙂
Life is never easy but often good
How do you justify a postgraduate diploma with family life which isn’t quite perfect? The answer is you just get on with it.
Funny just keeping busy just me and my dog gibby doing the stuff he likes
Its an older picture but this is his idea of joy or chasing magpies, we were at the beach yesterday just as it got dark no one there just me and the dog, and the sounds of the ocean.
It was a just the right amount of solitude to put life into perspective. When we moved here I had two wishes:
1. To be close to the ocean
2. To be able to see the mountains
We got both 6 km from the sea and an hour from the ski fields which we can see from home that is pretty cool.
Being by the sea or in the hills I have always found that they are good for my soul, they make me feel small and unique in that I am part of something that will be here long after me, and as I gaze and listen to the sounds of things I wonder what they have seen and heard in the past and how much more they are going to see.
Life is a wonderful gift so treasure every day and smile, you will live longer and be healthier 🙂
In between visits
Well back and forward to Christchurch what the hell do you do when you are waiting to find out what you can do to help. Some shop, for me this time to get outside. Funny I have always been dad never a mate, something I never wanted to be, however I have always there and supportive of the next big thing, so close to arsehole so many times as its the job of a dad to be everything a mate is not, but everything a true mate should be.
So why did they call it a kitset it turned out to be less than that! But I am glad it did as this will allow me to add some of me to this oven
It’s not perfect but I reckon it will cook pizza and that is the end goal
Piggy bank well and truly smashed
Well I spent some of our savings as I could not wait to work on the pizza oven so I have blown $65 NZ 🙂 However it was the trips to see my son and sort out his problems that broke the piggy, oh well Sh*t happens 🙂
So the oven what progress so much is the answer
I can conclude that I am very poor at making dome shapes with pumice it looked right to my wonky eyes but it was no where close had to add loads more packing as i went up but it worked out well in the end then time to let it dry once I added the cap to the top.
Today’s stupid moment
Today’s stupid moment was the attempt to line up all the bricks in the second row with the bricks in the first row.
No can’t be that hard after all the bricks are the same size so easy one on top of the next one except (reminder to self) I am building a dome, and for some reason I forgot what I was trying to do just was set to fail 😉 What confounded me was that the first few bricks line up but got increasingly out of whack. Cold shower slap myself around the face a few times and maths lessons remembered, something about spherical geometry and decreasing circumference of a circle as it moves away from the centre as the diameter /radius get shorter.
Well its looking ok now and here is where I pause for a few days of drying time and lots to do in the garden too, but I have also spent all my cement allowance this week so have to wait for more pocket money 🙂
Well the visit to the bees yesterday went well they are building up well funny watching them crash land when they are so loaded with pollen, poor little things but good to see it coming in. New Brood box added so they can get busy as spring hits properly.
In the garden the apricots are in bloom, the peaches and the plums are not far behind and the first daffodils of spring have arrived and the lambs are playing in the field of our neighbours and I think it might rain.
A day of firsts
Well yesterday was a big day for me and a day of firsts. Might seem simple if you are a paver or a bricklayer by trade, however I can’t count any of them as my trade and I have to say I am pleased with the results thus far.
So the the first row of base tiles was easy just a few blobs of No more nails on the outer tiles and it was done, it was made easy as I had worked hard to get the base level and flat. The next layer of tiles are the insulation layer, cooking hearth and the black entrance tiles.
This was easy apart from one tile being a fraction thicker than the rest, luckily I was able to place it in a new location where I can hide it so problem solved. The outline is draw on the tiles to aid with the correct location of the oven the first row of bricks is so important as it sets the shape of the oven.
Oh well today I built my first brick arch and I am happy to say oh my word what a pain in the back side that was 🙂 As I say I have read and read about this but then you have to do, and we all know books can impart knowledge but not ability and building an arch is definitely an doing skill not a reading skill 🙂 So set arch former at given height, mark the centre and whack some bricks up easy as! Maybe so but that arch went up and down more times than a whores draws. No matter what I did it just seemed to not want to fit, bowed here or the bricks did not fit, however I stuck with it and got them dry laid and looking pretty sweet. I marked the brick positions so it would make it easier to fix them into place later.
Before I could mortar the arch I needed to ensure that the first layer of the dome was dry laid and fitted correctly, So brick number 1 of the dome sets the datum point for the angle of the rest of the row and indeed the rest of the oven so pretty important. So once everything was set out you get to take it all back to pieces and start all over again but this time with mortar, and I have to say all the preparation was worth the effort, what sort of mess I would have been in if not, who know’s, but thus far I am a happy teddy.
So costs I am truly into the expensive bits now, and I brought all the tiles, bricks and flue from a company on the North Island as I could not get all the bits locally or as cheap and somethings I could not even get. Taking into account $195 NZ for freight the parts I required were still $1000 to $1500 cheaper which is truly outrageous considering the quality of what I brought is better sometimes I just can’t work out pricing in NZ.
Freight $195 NZ
$385 NZ for Bricks and tiles insulation, fire cement and arch formers
$85 NZ Stainless flue
No More Nails $8.44 NZ
Mortar $14.36 NZ
Total = 687.80
Total so far = $890.80 and I only have a about $60 NZ more to spend to get it to a working stage (more cement and mortar) So coming in at under a $1000NZ is a great deal
Going Slowly 