Low and slow - New pizza oven

[adjio]

Ok, so I'm new here... I recently semi impulse purchased a pizza oven after spending some time with a mate who has a traditional pizza oven jobbie, so me and the missus don't get fat I've started looking for ways to do more outdoors cooking, then I found this site and can feel the obsession building. Awesome info guys... After seing whats out there I think I purchased the wrong thing, but it's what I've got so I'll need to figure it out...

So this is the oven. It cooks a pretty awesome disk, we've had up to 15 people over and it can do it pretty easy. Few dips and spikes at the start, the temp's are leveling out now.




As you can see it gets cleaned regularly , it's got 2 chambers, bottom firebox, there are 2 vents in the bottom part of the cooking chamber that can be opened for smoking or closed off, intake vent on the front and a exhaust vent which is accessed from the inside of the cooking chamber.

My Aim: To get some low and slow cooking happening, pulled pork, roasts, anything out of the 'what did you cook' section on this site, it's been getting me pretty excited !!!

My Questions:

- How would you stack the fire box, I don't think a snake will be enough around the side / back / side (I know I need to do a test long burn, I will when I get a thermometer into the cooking chamber)
- Would you go charcoal and just keep topping up ?
- Would you guys replace the top rack with a mesh grille ??
- Would I put a tray of water on the lower level of the cooking chamber ??
- Do you think I will need to find a way to seal the fire chamber, if you look at the top photo there is a 1-2 mm gap around the door ?

Anyways, awesome site, I am going to learn heaps. Once I get some wood bits and pieces from Terry I can get started.

Cheers.

Adam

[urbangriller]

You shouldn't need water, but if you want it'd be OK.

What is the cool down cycle like? My Dome type WF Pizza oven takes 12 hours to go from 250C down to 150C.....that's perfect, put the pork in, come back 10-12 hours later!

Cheers
Chris

[adjio]

Thanks Chris,

Nahh, I don't think it has anywhere close to that heat retention, TBH I thought it would hold heat a lot better than it does, but I need to do a test burn and figure it out I guess...

Would you go charcoal or beads ??

[urbangriller]

I'd go the robot Turds and some firewood....get it to temp, put the tucker in (use a water pan as it will hold some heat), when it drops to 120C ish, throw in more robot turds so it comes back up again....repeat that process till the tucker is cooked!

Chris

[Cobblerdave]

G'day
You have an internal chimney as well. Quite a lot of heat can be lost, and or controlled throught that. Like a charcoal webber block off the lower vents and control using the upper one in this case, your chimney. The damper on the chimney can be as simple as a ceramic tile placed on top and moved to block of part of all of the chimney as you see fit. Use you bottom vents to kick a few more beads or wood into action then shut them down.
The bimetal temp meter is inaccurate but you can still use them as a guide as you get used to them. If you use a remote probe thermometer in the meat that's the important temp you need to know.
I've just been given an iGrill one and its a great piece of kit. Just as good as my old expensive one and the graph gives you a great guide to finishing times so you can slow as you see fit.
Regards dave

[Bentley]

Nice unit!

[Narmnaleg]

Welcome to the forum Adam, I look forward to seeing this unit in action.

[Jars]

Nice stuff mate. My dad has one similar to this sitting at his place, I'm gonna try and get it off him once my pergola is up, as he hasnt used it in bloody ages! Keen to see how you go with the low and slow on this thing.

[titch]

I have a similar setup.
try burning stick in the top chamber, close the door on your bottom area and monitor your temps.
We often do pulled pork and slow lamb that way.
Sitting around with a going fire a few beers and food slow cooking in the lower chamber is hard to beat

[urbangriller]

Titch..You mean Fire in the top, Food in the bottom???

Chris

[titch]

Titch..You mean Fire in the top, Food in the bottom???

Chris

yes correct, top door open for ambience , nice fire glow.
Bottom door closed, air vent cracked to temp, takes a while to heat but works great on ours, on this one I suggest a try

[urbangriller]

Titch..You mean Fire in the top, Food in the bottom???

Chris

yes correct, top door open for ambience , nice fire glow.
Bottom door closed, air vent cracked to temp, takes a while to heat but works great on ours, on this one I suggest a try

I like that thinking!

Chris

[adjio]

Thanks for all the info guys...

Cobblerdave; this "The damper on the chimney can be as simple as a ceramic tile placed on top" worked really well, I didn't realize that the chamber bypassed the internal damper.

I'll have to give the upside down 'titch' approved method a go at some stage...

Did a 7hr cook on a rib eye roast yesterday, trial run so I force fed the neighbors... Fairly stoked with the process and outcome, kept the oven temp @ ~70-75 with a stall at about 72, meat temp got to 61 when I pulled it out, smoked with some big red pellets from Terry and apple chips...

Results





Next mission, PULLED Something...

[Gumb]

Great result.

[Bentley]

What a horrible thing to do to neighbors...WOW!

...rib eye roast yesterday, trial run so I force fed the neighbors...