Can you imagine the look on the caveman’s face when he first discovered fire? He’d be feeling pretty chuffed with himself: he just created a source of light, warmth and (most importantly) cooking, all in one epic discovery.
While it’s not exactly the same thing, you’ll get a similar feeling when lighting the very first fire in your brand new pizza oven. After all, you’re following in your cavemen ancestors’ footsteps: using the open flame to cook your food, and getting in touch with those primal instincts.
And luckily for you, you’ve got the internet to help you out… something that the cavemen sadly missed out on. Here’s how to light the perfect fire in your perfect pizza oven, to make the perfect meal.
1) Open the door and the chimney vent
To get a fire started, you need plenty of oxygen flow. Open the pizza oven door and chimney vent to allow plenty of oxygen into the chamber.
2) Start with old newspapers, or firelighters
The most natural way of preparing the fire is to roll up old newspapers into loosely spherical balls. Don’t wrap them too tight: this will deprive your newspaper balls of oxygen, which we just stressed the importance of. Also, don’t use magazines! The coloured, glossy paper is smelly and toxic – not ideal for preparing food with.
If you don’t have newspaper, you can use firelighters to start the fire. We’ll get to this in Step 4.
3) Place your kindling on top
On top of your scrunched-up newspaper balls, start placing the thinnest twigs as kindling. Make sure they’re nice and dry, otherwise they won’t catch fire properly. Place each twig diagonally, one after the other, making an ‘X’ shape. This allows for more pockets of oxygen.
4) Place your smaller logs
Now it’s time to place the smaller logs on top of the kindling in the pizza oven. The idea is to gradually build the fire up, from the easiest material to burn (newspaper) to the hardest material to burn (big logs). If you’re using firelighters instead of newspaper, now you can tuck the firelighters underneath your kindling.
5) Larger logs
On top of the smaller logs, place your large logs in your pizza oven.
6) C’mon baby, light my fire!
Time to light the fire! Keep the vents open and light the newspaper or firelighters using a safety match or barbecue lighter.
7) Monitor, increase heat and cook
Monitor the progress of your fire. Once there’s a bed of hot coals going, add your heaviest logs to really turn up the heat. When they start burning, you can half-close the chimney vent. Wait until the temperature is right (for pizza, it’s around 400 degrees Celsius) and start cooking!
Now that you know how to start a fire in a pizza oven, it’s time to invest in one! Sydney Fire Bricks are Australia’s favourite builders of premium quality wood-fired ovens, fire pits and smokers, delivering their products across the country. Browse the range and pick the perfect wood-fired oven for your home today.