Wood Fired Apple Pie

Baking in a Wood Fired Oven: After pushing the coals to the back of the wood fired oven near the wall, brush the ashes off of the floor.  The chunks of glowing hardwood coals should have little or no flame when the apple pie goes in. Every 15 minutes, turn apple pie so the other end faces the fire.

1 pie = 2 crusts (10 inches)

Ingredients for Crust:
2 2/3 cup flour
1 tsp. salt
1 cup shortening
7-8 tablespoons ice water

Mix flour, salt & shortening; cut in with pastry cutter. Add water last. Roll into a ball. You may refrigerate or roll out right away.

Ingredients for Filling:
12-14 apples (Golden Delicious, regular size)
¾ cup sugar
2 tablespoons flour
1 tsp. cinnamon
¼ tsp. nutmeg

Peel and slice apples. Mix all ingredients together. Make sure to fill pie all the way before baking.  Brush crust with milk and sprinkle with sugar.  Poke with a fork. Bake 1 hour at 350° F and put cookie sheet under pie.

* Put cut-outs on after milk & sugar. *

Wood Fired Stuffing

Baking in a Wood Fired Oven: After pushing the coals to the back of the wood fired oven near the wall, brush the ashes off of the floor.  The chunks of glowing hardwood coals should have little or no flame when the stuffing goes in. After 15 minutes, turn stuffing so the other end faces the fire.

Ingredients:

1 lb. coarsely ground Italian sausage, crumbled

2 lbs. mushrooms, chopped

1 head celery, chopped

2-3 onions, finely chopped

1 pkg. Mrs. Gibbon’s Cornbread Stuffing (use only 1 pouch)

Direction:

Sauté sausages. In another pan, sauté mushrooms. In yet another pan, sauté everything together celery and onions.

Mix everything together and add cornbread stuffing.

Place in a greased 9x13 casserole. Add stock (not too watery).

Bake for 30 minutes at 350-375°, first covered, then uncovered.

If too dry, add stock.

Luxury Outdoor Kitchen Installation

We enjoy some of the best weather in the San Diego area. Outdoor living space gives you a place to prepare meals in your outdoor kitchen, entertain or relax with family and friends.

From exposed beam construction to retractable glass walls this outdoor living area was designed for serious outdoor entertaining.

Click Here to view a tour of this luxurious outdoor living space.

We supplied the client with the wood fired ovens for this outdoor living space.

Wood-fired Oven Roasted Potatoes

Ingredients:

8 medium Yukon potatoes

Extra virgin olive oil

Salt & pepper

2 sprigs of fresh rosemary

2 cloves of garlic, chopped

Peel and wash the potatoes, and cut them into bite-sized pieces. Place them into a greased casserole. Season the potatoes with salt and pepper, drizzle with olive oil, and sprinkle with garlic and rosemary. Bake at 400^oF (200^oC) for approximately 1 hour. These are very easy and delicious. Enjoy!

Serves 4

Prosciutto & Arugula Pizza in a Wood Burning Oven

Use one of our Forno wood burning ovens to create this light summer pizza.

Basic pizza dough (recipe on previous blog)
Flour, for rolling out dough
Extra virgin olive oil
Thinly sliced prosciutto Fresh arugula, washed
Parmigiano Reggiano shavings

Roll out pizza dough, adding flour as needed to prevent sticking. Drizzle with olive oil and bake directly on stone in wood-burning oven at about 600-700F (300-350C) until crisp and golden-brown on the edges. Remove from oven and top with prosciutto, arugula, and parmigiano. Serve right away.

Using Real Cheese for Your Pizza

What’s the point of using a fantastic tool like a wood burning pizza oven if you’re going to use subpar ingredients? It’s arguable that cheese is the most important part of the pie, but many people end up using cheeses from the grocery store that have a bunch of additives and chemicals that take away from the real flavor of good cheese. The most common cheese used for pizza pies is mozzarella, which is available in a variety of different ways including fresh, skim and infused with a variety of different spices and herbs.

The potential of cheese and pizza is so much bigger than mozzarella. There are over 400 different types of Italian cheeses, many of which would be fantastic as a main cheese or as an accompanying flavor on a pie. The key to picking a good cheese is to find one that melts consistently and goes well with the flavor of tomatoes or whatever sauce you are using, but even this isn’t a hard a fast rule. Some pizzas use unique cheese, topping and sauce combinations to create something completely unique. You can even create a pizzas that barely uses any cheese at all except for a generous dusting of Parmesan Reggiano or Pecorino Romano. Whatever kind of pizza you are looking to make, your wood burning oven can make it burst with flavor.

Safety and Your Wood Burning Pizza Oven

Cooking with a wood burning oven is a fun experience that produces delicious food, but when proper safety precautions are not followed bad things can happen.  Newer wood-fired ovens are marvels of modern innovation and technology that contain a wide variety of options that make operating the oven as safe as possible. Even with these conditions, however, it’s important to operate the oven with caution in mind so that no unnecessary injuries or burns occur. In the end you’re still cooking with fire, so paying close attention to safety is paramount.

The primary safety precaution a person can take is simple; wear protection. If embers from the wood fire are flying everywhere when you adjust or add wood then wear goggles to protect your eyes from being burned. When putting food in and out of the oven make sure you are wearing protective gloves that can stand the very high temperatures that some wood burning ovens get to.  Also, whenever you have a fire roaring in the pit keep at least one eye on the oven. It’s not necessary to watch it like a hawk; although if children are around you should, but make sure you are checking in often to make sure nothing goes wrong. Wood burning ovens are fun, but an accident or simple mistake can ruin everything quickly.

Creating Your Ideal Pizza

A vast majority of modern pizza restaurants stick to a stable of a few very common ingredients: dough, red sauce, mozzarella cheese, meat and vegetables. It’s this formula that creates classics like pepperoni pizza, all meat pizzas, vegetarian pizzas and other common specialties you see at most mass marketed pizza chains. This stable of ingredients works for a lot of people, but the world of pizza is so much bigger than what we have been led to believe. When you have the equipment to make your own pizzas, like a wood burning oven, then you have the chance to create pizzas with ingredients that almost no restaurant would ever offer. Below are ways you change ingredients to create more interesting and flavorful pies.

-Cheeses. Mozzarella has been the king of pizza cheese for a long time, but there are so many other options. Feta cheese provides a strong aroma to pizzas looking for a bit of a punch and it goes great with other Greek ingredients. Asiago cheese has a deep nutty flavor and has a much stronger profile than mozzarella. Goat cheese offers a very distinctive flavor and will create a pizza with an almost completely different flavor than you’ve tried before.

-Sauces. Red tomato sauce is very versatile and flavorful, but it’s not the only game in town. Olive oil can be used in a variety ways as a substitute for red sauce. For example, you can infuse olive oil with things like garlic and basic to create a unique and powerful flavor. You can also use a white sauce on a pizza by making a roux or Alfredo sauce for a more creamy and delicate flavor. Some people even use things like BBQ sauce or salad dressing to create their desired flavors.

-Toppings. There are not a whole lot of things that don’t go well on a pizza. Open up your imagination a little and experiment with lots of different things. One of my personal favorites is artichokes and roasted bell peppers. You can also experiment with different types of meats. Use ingredient combinations from other types of food to figure out what would go well together on a pizza.

Perfecting Your Backyard with a Wood-Fired Oven

You may have looked at your backyard lately and thought that something was missing. Sure you’ve got the swimming pool, the lawn chairs and the outdoor refrigerator, but there is a certain flare that seems to be missing from the environment. A direct or indirect wood-fired oven may be just what you are looking for. If you’ve never seen a wood burning oven before then take a look through our wood fired oven gallery to see what the fuss is all about. Dolce Vita has a variety of outdoor wood burning ovens that would be a perfect addition to the decor in your backyard.

Our Forno direct and indirect wood-fired ovens can be constructed in a variety of different ways to fit in with the design concepts of your backyard. The ovens can be built into rock surfaces to maintain the same granite motif that's part of the rest of your backyard. They can be constructed as stand alone units or as part of a larger outdoor kitchen arrangement as well. Wood burning ovens provide an elegance and touch of class that is simply unmatched when it comes to outdoor cooking appliances. Not only will these ovens make your backyard look better, but they will make entertaining and cooking a far more enjoyable experience for you and your guests. There’s no reason to consider a wood-fired oven as an addition to your backyard.

Baking Bread in Your Wood Burning Oven

Most Americans these days buy their bread at the grocery store. While some companies try to sell a fresh product every day, especially local bakers, most bread you find at the store will be designed to last a long time. This built in longevity comes with a cost, flavor. Baking fresh bread at home was once a time honored tradition that has been replaced by mass factory baking that will do anything to cut costs. Baking bread at home is far easier than most people imagine. With a wood burning oven, it can not only be easy to bake bread, but the resulting flavor will be far beyond what you could have thought was possible.

Bread recipes for a wood burning oven are abundant and can be found on a variety of sites. The basic principles involve flour, water and yeast, but beyond that there are almost an infinite amount of combinations for making delicious home made bread. One of the most special aspects of baking bread in a wood burning oven is the ability of the dough to soak in the flavors of the wood smoke and any other dishes that we baking in the oven previously. This creates a unique flavor profile that you simply can’t get from store bought bread or by baking bread in a gas oven or bread machine.

The Spectacle of Wood Burning Ovens

We spend a lot of time here talking about how great wood burning ovens are for cooking pizza and traditional Italian dishes, but what sometimes gets left behind is how excited people are to watch the workings of a wood-fired oven. Most people simply don’t have experience cooking with fire unless they are frequent campers or own a wood burning stove of their own. Cooking with a wood fire is a completely different experience than cooking with gas or coal, and the process will have people looking on in awe.

Cooking with fire is a spectacle that the whole family can appreciate. From the first phase of lighting the wood to the bubbling cheese and crust of a finishing pizza, cooking with fire is an instinctive craving that exists in all of us. Not only will your wood burning oven produce terrific results in flavor and texture, but it will be wonderful to look at in the process. Half the appeal of cooking at home comes from the aromas and sounds that result from cooking with fire. Family and friends gathering around the wood-fired stove is one of the most appealing parts of cooking with fire, and the buzz generated from the spectacle will liven up the atmosphere more than any takeout food could.

Restaurants Prefer Wood-Fired Ovens

More and more lately we are seeing the presence of wood burning ovens in restaurants, not only physically in the restaurant itself, but in the title. Gourmet chefs and restaurant owners are slowly discovering how much better food can be in a wood burning oven. They are turning out wildly creative and delicious dishes that are having their customers raving. So what is the secret behind wood burning ovens that have all of these establishments changing their practices? One reason is that these wood-fired ovens are really able to pump out the heat. Wood burning ovens can reach temperatures far higher than normal gas ovens, and thus can create flavors that you would otherwise never be able to get.

Another reason customers and restaurants love their wood burning ovens is the spectacle. Burning wood creates a smell and display that is quite unlike any other restaurant experience. Many establishments decide to display their wood-fired ovens in easy to see locations so that customers can gaze on their pizza and other dishes as they cook next to open flames. This experience creates a buzz in the dining room and gets word about the restaurant spreading quickly. For all of these reasons and more, private homeowners are also finding the experience of wood burning ovens to be fantastic. Nothing is quite as special as baking a gourmet pizza or dessert right at home but with time honored cooking traditions that come straight from Italy.

What Makes a Wood Burning Oven Special?

Everyone knows what an oven is. You heat it up, put some food inside, close the door, the food gets hot, then you eat it. It’s old, old technology by which food gets better when the molecules inside heat up and release tons of flavors that would have otherwise gone unnoticed. Cooking food has been around in human culture since we have written records and far before that. But through industrialization and modern technology the way we cook has become sterilized. Families and tribes used to cook around a wood burning fire, but now we cook in metal ovens heated by electric coils and a lot of the flavors have been lost.

Wood burning ovens bring families back to a traditional cooking style that is a huge part of our evolution. Food cooked with the heat of burning wood develops a distinct flavor profile that completely eclipses the flavors you get from a regular oven.  While a normal oven only imparts heat upon cooked food, wood burning ovens impart the flavor of the wood and smoke into everything that is cooked in the oven. This added flavor creates really unique dishes depending on the type of wood you use. This is why the best pizza and Italian restaurants in the world use wood burning ovens to cook their high quality items.

Making Great Pizza in a Wood Burning Oven

There are so many places out there that make bad pizza it’s hard to count. There are a lot of reasons for this. Pizza is so popular that a lot of people try to take advantage by making a cheap mass marketed but ultimately flavorless product. Some people just don’t know how to make a great pizza because they don’t have the right ingredients or the right tools. Truly great pizza needs a few things to be great. It needs fresh high quality ingredients, attention and it needs to be cooked in a wood burning oven.  There are two very important reasons for this.

Using wood burning pizza ovens for cooking is a time honored tradition in Italy. If you want Italian food that tastes like it does in the home country, or you simply want your food to taste better period, cooking in a wood fired oven in a superior option. One reason this is true is that wood burning ovens can reach temperatures far higher than your traditional kitchen oven. This higher heat creates flavors in your food that you might have never tasted before. Second, the wood in wood fired ovens helps create unique flavors in your dishes, especially pizza. Pizza cooked at high temperatures has caramelized flavors and textures that you simply can’t get from a normal oven. It also absorbs the wonder flavor from the wood smoke, making each pizza you make unique and delicious.