Acoma's cure

[dalucca2003]

Re: Acoma's cure

RC,
Did you try Dave's method from his vid? Its pretty easy to do and produces a surprisingly round pie.

Can you send a link to the video. Thanks.

[RCLake]

Re: Acoma's cure

RC,
Did you try Dave's method from his vid? Its pretty easy to do and produces a surprisingly round pie.

I'm trying his method, I think I'm doing smaller dough balls though. In a 825 gram batch I'm dividing it into 6 pieces or 140 grams each. So more like individual pies but they are good. I think I'll increase the weight of each ball by half next time. Still won't be as big as Dave is doing, I think he's over 250g.
I guess what is wrong with a football shaped pie.

[Xabia Jim]

Re: Acoma's cure

I'm still working at getting the pizza dough to turn out round.

Why do we need round pizzas?

.....go with the flow of the dough....artisan pizza shapes are cool

[Acoma]

Re: Acoma's cure

RC, I need to pick up the ingredience. I want to give it a shot tomorrow, but for today, ribs. I threw in two slabs at 3pm, with floor temp of 275. I started off with a reheat of the oven for 5 minutes with a fresh fire. Once it got going I threw in the ribes with floor temp of 325. I figure it will stay smokey for a few hours in there with everything closed up. I will check it at 7pm, then coat for an hour with sauce every 20 minutes, 3 times. I will update this evening with results.

[gjbingham]

Re: Acoma's cure

RC,
Did you try Dave's method from his vid? Its pretty easy to do and produces a surprisingly round pie.

[RCLake]

Re: Acoma's cure

I'm glad you are done. I would have guessed you would of had pizza yesterday afternoon. I did a slab of ribs last week, so easy to do and so good. I'm still working at getting the pizza dough to turn out round.

[Acoma]

Re: Acoma's cure

Yes indeed! As I stated in the curing strategy thread, I had kept a 900-950 temp on upper dome the last half hour, then closed up shop at 1:30pm Saturday. I went out to check the retained heat for dome and found inside dome at 453 degrees. This was great, an approximately 65% retained heat from a 700 cure day. More insulation to apply too. I may pick up some ribs today and throw them inside for about 4 to 5 hours so that they fall off the bone.

[gjbingham]

Re: Acoma's cure

Ahhh, making pizza in a WFO. Something like being a babe in the woods all over again. Another journey! Buon viaggio Robert!

[Les]

Re: Acoma's cure

Les came by, and gave his analysis. He figured the work was A OK

It is a good body of work! In regard to the cracks - I think it's the nature of this beast. The quality of work that Robert put into this confirms my belief .... cracks happen Robert had the oven up to a little less than 800 degrees when I was there and there was no visible smoke escaping from the cracks - looks like he is good to go. The oven is going to pale in comparison to his next endeavor - landscaping

Les...

[Acoma]

Re: Acoma's cure

DONE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I decided that after so many hours, and I mean many, that at the end I had to crank it up. Well, crank it after being out there so long was to 950 dome and 550 at dome floor entrance. I closed much of the door with bricks and will check morning temp. I also used my tarp over the entrance area to keep heat within the oven area. No worries, been done throughout. I say we go BIG Monday with food to cook. I have to get pizza knowledge together now, and oh ya, to furnace cement outside dome (that is a must).

[Acoma]

Re: Acoma's cure

Xabia, that jourjey is coming to an end.

I found that the soot in the dome finally vanished half way through the cure today. I walk away from soot, come back to clean..

With a clean dome, I discover a 7 course vertical crack. Not sure if it is done, and it is at the location in the back, just expanded. My arch cracks have not though, and no seepage of soot to the blanket.

I believe that I should get the furnace cement and seal the cracks this coming week along the dome. As for the arch? I still have to figure that out, but it will be dealt with eventually.

Les cam by, and gave his analysis. He figured the work was A OK

So, when can I get HOT? Do you think cracks are done? If this many hours of curing has gone by with this heat increase and duration, will more occur? Have any of you seen more cracks after this long in hours and temps? I want to play with dough

[Xabia Jim]

Re: Acoma's cure

it's a spiritual journey eh?

[Acoma]

Re: Acoma's cure

I have used the whole upper dome area, but always using the keystone area first, then moving the gun for relative measurements. Reason is that I take small logs, mini pieces and spread them in triangle form. I frequently shove ashes, or embers to the edges of the dome and keep the middle 70% clean with logs burning. This allows the whole dome to be within 15 degrees. I figure that with all these hours curing that this method has worked great. I credit RT for this. At first I would just build small fires around the middle during the first two days, but with higher temps, the spreading worked best.

As for soot, still black and all over. Not until I get a raging fire will it likely go away. No biggy. This will likely be when the soot disappears, and ignore the error message, link appears to work:

PhotoPlog - Error

[RCLake]

Re: Acoma's cure

Great job Robert, when you post temp measurements where and how are you doing it. i.e. IR gun aimed at the Keystone? How sooty is everything?

[Acoma]

Re: Acoma's cure

Sorry with the overdrive of posting, but isn't that what documenting curing process performance is about. If I did it once a day, I would forget half the details.

I have also noticed that the early stages of curing each day it takes time to get the heat to maintain approximate temps. Meaning, I put wood in, it flares up, spread the wood, coals around for balanced heat, then let it cool about 50-70 degrees. Put fresh wood in, and repeat. Early on the oven will cool down more rappidly, as the day progresses, the heat is held better. This morning it is holding better earlier. This might have to do with getting to those higher temps, which are saturating bricks earlier. Agree?