Recipes: Pizza Oven

I Decided to make a cheap brick oven. Did a lot of research and decided against the expensive several thousand dollar, super heat resistant, insulated mode. And instead aim for something less than $200. Ended up around $140 total.

Started out making a frame with 2x4's and plywood.

Poured in concrete. And left about an inch of space.

After a few days and letting it dry, I started to question the size.

So i broke it into parts and made it into a much larger mold.

While the mold started to dry i made some rough arches on a piece of plywood and traced the general shape.

I cut out two plywood parts and used some extra wood to make a form to set the bricks on.

Since I needed the entrance to be 63% of the rear arch height I added a 2x4 to the bottom of the frame to give it extra height.

Sizing up the opening to the rear arch

Had a few more days until the concrete dried. So I took the time to cut a pizza peel out of the extra plywood i had.

With the extra days while the concrete was drying i chopped up a big log of mesquite I had laying in the back. took the bark off and quartered the wood.

built a base for the oven out of cinder blocks. two rows on the side and one in the middle. spaced out evenly enough to support most of the concrete foundation that will sit on it. My custom smoker is to the right.

Once the form dried we lifted the foundation onto the cinder blocks. I used plain sand to fill in the low spots and make an even surface. Right on top of this I put a concrete board that fit exactly into the wood and leveled it off to the top.

after a little trial i arranged the clay bricks onto the top of the concrete board. I left every brick loose.

Just a test fit of the arch's

used some shims to build the arch to measure where things will be on the platform.

Test fitting the back wall and sides.

I mortared the back wall and first arch. The best way to fit the brick was to keep the top brick at a slight elevation. and we ended up liking the look.

Completed first arch.

After the first dried we moved the wood form up and built the second arch. the third arch will be done the same way.

completed second arch

As we started building the arch we decided we enjoyed the wider entrance and spaced out the bottom bricks a bit more.

first two arch's and back wall self supporting.

After a few days i lit a very tiny fire and blocked the entrance to check for smoke leaks. there were a few i plugged with motar.

The front arch and last chamber arch started getting put up at the same time.

After some study i decided i wanted a small flue at the entrance for smoke. so we broke two bricks to create a gap.

Youll notice a gap between the two arches. this will be filled with parts of bricks and motar.

youll see the large and small bricks that were used to fill in the gap between the arches.

first view of the inside of the oven.

pizza peel and oven

before i can cook in it i need to cure the oven by lighting a series of small fires. This one wasn't much more than 250.

Second cure fire a bit hotter.

Third curing fire even hotter.

Update; on valentines day we had some friends and family over and lit the sucker up. took 1.5 hours to get the soot to clear. this got the floor to 900F and the roof was not even measurable with my thermo. It only reads to 1023F.