Continuous Cooking: 900ºF thru 200ºF?

[clofgreen]

I'm trying to find information on how to get the most cooking out of my WFO. It seems from what I've read in my searches that there is a huge hole between pizza temperatures (900ºF) and the next temp which seems to be 500ºF. Does anyone know of a thread or document that explores what things can be cooked at every temperature range?

Craig

[Tscarborough]

None that I know of, but as it usually works, that 9 to 500 degree hole is generally from pizza night to hungover morning, so it would be wasted anyway. I generally do pizza>bread>meat>vegetable.

[clofgreen]

Originally Posted by Tscarborough

That 9 to 500 degree hole is generally from pizza night to hungover morning, so it would be wasted anyway.

Now that's funny.

[texassourdough]

IMO there is no hole/gap. I cook/bake in my oven from pizza temp down.

Citing of 900 is interesting. That is, in my experience a rather troubling temperature to bake at. 800 is far more standard reference for hearth temp for pizza and many prefer 725 to 750. Baking bread in a WFO typically begins with oven prep at the 575 to 600 degree range. Loading bread is usually targeted for around 540 to 565 in my experience. Thus the gap is much smaller than the 400 degrees you implied.

And there are plenty of thing one can cook in the window from 600 to 750 or 800. Think of things that cook fast or are already cooked and that you want to warm and char. Things like
- cooked eggplant, EVOO, herbs de provence, capers
- shrimp, EVOO, pepper flakes.
- olives with the pits in EVOO
- sausages with ???
etc.

[Les]

There are quite a few books on using your WFO. What would be cool is one that is organized by temp, not the food. You may be on to something Craig - you just need to compile it for the rest of us.

[Lburou]

Originally Posted by Les

There are quite a few books on using your WFO. What would be cool is one that is organized by temp, not the food. You may be on to something Craig - you just need to compile it for the rest of us.

There is a book that talks a lot about building and managing the fire, cooking utensils, and then, before giving several recipes for each cooking environment, discusses cooking ranges for:

• Pizza oven environment (650-750 F),
• Roasting oven environment (550 F with flame),
• Bake oven environment (350-450 F),
• Grilling oven environment (live coals),
• Bread oven environment (450-550 F).

The book is _The Art of Wood Fired Cooking_ by A. M. The author nimbly explores cooking in the realms already visited by our Karangi Dude. I study Doug's dishes, but don't know enough about my oven to go there yet. This book is entertaining me and teaching me something I want to learn at the same time. Its giving me courage to try cooking many things with a live fire, besides pizza.

P.S. I did find a fornobravo page touching these issues here.

[GianniFocaccia]

It is exciting that a WFO presents a new realm of cooking options because of the extended temperature range of a conventional home oven. Because my oven isn't finished yet, I can only contemplate how I will need to modify my approach to dishes I currently cook in the house (oven and stovetop). Is it safe to assume 500F in the WFO is the same as the house oven? How is one to adjust for the giant radiant heat (infrared) panel that is the top of the dome? Is this what is responsible for the shortened cooking time of a turkey?

I am all for decreasing the time it takes to put dinner on the table, but not at the expense of flavor/texture. Some dishes simply take time to develop to their fullest potential, something foreign to the world of 30-minute meals and fast food. One of the greatest allures of the WFO, to me, is the long-declining heat curve that allows a minimum of attention when slow-cooking stews, beans, soups, etc.

Here is a short piece that shows probably 25 different kinds of dishes that are prepared in a commercial ceramic oven, albeit a gas one.

Cooking in a Wood or Gas-Fired Oven - YouTube

[Les]

Originally Posted by Lburou

• Pizza oven environment (650-750 F),
• Roasting oven environment (550 F with flame),
• Bake oven environment (350-450 F),
• Grilling oven environment (live coals),
• Bread oven environment (450-550 F).

The book is _The Art of Wood Fired Cooking_ by A. M.

Thanks Lee - I wasn't aware of this, sounds like a must have.

[Lburou]

Originally Posted by GianniFocaccia

....snip....Is it safe to assume 500F in the WFO is the same as the house oven? ...snip...

The author adds 75-100 F to the cooking temperatures recommended in ordinary recipes and reports the cooking time can be expected to be one-third faster. She measures only the oven floor temp.

[Karangi Dude]

Gentlemen,
I am with Jay on this subject you can cook, bake, fry, saute, grill or slow cook there is a huge temperature range that can be used for different dishes.

For eg; you can cook a piece of steak from 400c down to 90c depends on how long you leave it in the oven it needs to reach at least 65c internal temperature.
At 400c it would only take minutes but at 90 to 100c it would take hours.
I always allow about 8 to 10hrs if I am doing a stew or something like lamb shanks
I put them in a fully equalised oven at 110 to 120c.

It is all about heat management and of course being able to cook helps
(I have about 40years clocked up)

A thing that I have noticed when looking at dishes that members put up is that there ovens don't seem to have been fully saturated there is quite often carbon still on the sides of their ovens. Our ovens take time to fully saturate even when they have burnt off all the carbon they are nowhere near saturation it takes at least another hour or more to START to reach saturation.
It might be ok to start cooking pizza just after the carbon has burnt off but to get the best out of our ovens they need to be fully saturated and that takes time and effort and time to rest so that they can then equalise.
I have proved this many times using the readings from the thermo couplings that I have in my oven, I don't use my hand held laser thermometer much (only to show friends how hot the surface is) I know my oven enough now that I don't probably even need the thermo couplings but they have been a good help to get started and to prove to myself the time it takes to get these ovens saturated and equalised.
I covered some of this in my build thread in posts #106 #111 #155

There is two thermometers that I would suggest and that is;
1. A probe type thermometer (through the door or through the walls) to measure the air temp inside the oven when the door is on
2. A probe type thermometer for checking the internal temperature of whatever you are cooking eg; meat or bread it can be digital or the old fashioned type that my wife uses for making preserves (see pics below) they are not left in the food while cooking but inserted to check the temperature.