Dan:
Check out the new web site for OVENCRAFTERS
http://pomo.nbn.com/home/ovncraft
I had the opportunity to apprentice with the master oven builder in the US.
His name is Alan Scott. I learned a great deal from him about ovens of all
types. Alan sells plans that the average person can use to build an oven
in their back yard, or wherever.
About a book, Alan is in the process if co-authoring a book which has much
info about wood-fired brick ovens in it, but it won't be available anytime
soon.
There is one book that I have that talks about ovens. It is titled " The
Bread Ovens of Quebec" by Lise Boily and Jean-Fracois Blanchette. This
book comes to us through the National Museums of Canada. You can easily
obtain a copy from Alan Scott.
I have another book that I picked up while on a baking tour in France, but
if you are not fluent in french, it won't help a great deal. I can give
you info on this book if you like.
About firing the oven in advance, we always fired our the night before
really well. I remember tending a fire( off and on) for about 3 hours,
then I went to bed. If you use limb wood that is about 1 foot shorter than
the length of your oven, you can build the fire in the oven opening, and
the fire will burn throughout your oven through the night with very littla
attendance from you.
The morning of baking, if we need to, we would build a small fire to keep
the temp at a certain point. It's not hard to do at all. The nice thing
about Alan's retained heat oven design is once fired it stays hot for
days. We would bake so many other things that it was truly one of the most
efficent ways to cook/bake i'd ever experienced.
You can build a fire the day you plan to use the oven, but the heat will
not retain as well and last as long after baking for heat efficiency. It
only takes a few hours to get it heated for bread, pizza not as long. When
you bake pizza in an oven like this, the technique is to have a flame
remaining in the oven while you are baking ( the coals and fire are raked
to the left or right side of the oven). The fire helps bake the top of the
pizza to perfection!
Alan has a web page ( http://pomo.nbn.com/home/ovncraft) that will give
you so much info about what plans he has available and I would suggest
going to that page and sending Ovencrafters e-mail about costs and such.
He would be the best judge of these things. Of course all oven costs
differ according to material costs in your area.
Don't be fooled by other imitation brick oven KITS , for bread baking
you'll want a retained heat oven. There is no match in quality. You can
use this oven for other things too ( ex Pizza, flat bread, beans, desserts,
meats - anything you'd consider baking). If you buy a pizza oven kit, it
will not hold heat well enough ( or long enough) for great bread baking!
Dan I hope this helps you. If you need anymore info don't hestiate to e-mail
g
Check out the web site for OVENCRAFTERS
http://pomo.nbn.com/home/ovncraft