English cherries, their colours ranging from delicate pink-flushed gold through to bright red and almost black, are in season for only about six weeks from the end of June. Be quick and make the most of our British cherry produce with this crumbly wood fired snack!

You’ll need:

• 140g light muscovado sugar
• 3 tbsp golden syrup
• 140g butter
• 250g rolled oats
• 85g raisins or sultanas
• 85g walnut pieces (or use your favourite nuts, roughly chopped)
• 50g sesame or mixed seeds
• 25g fresh cherries
• 50g ready-to-eat apricots, finely chopped

 

Firstly start by firing up your wood fired oven to optimum temperature then let it cook to a baking environment, see the Cooking Techniques guide for more information on this!

Gently heat the sugar, golden syrup and butter in a pan until the sugar and butter have both melted. Stir the oats, raisins, walnuts, seeds and cranberries into the pan until coated in the butter.

Spoon half the oaty mix into a tray (23 x 23cm or thereabouts). Scatter the apricots and cherries over the top, then top with the remaining oat mix. Pack the mix down well and smooth with the back of a metal spoon. Bake until dark golden. Leave to cool completely before cutting into squares of crumbly goodness with a sharp knife.

 

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Ingredients:

500g red rooster potatoes (or similar) unpeeled cut into 5mm rounds

80ml olive oil

2 cod loins about 160g each

250g cherry tomatoes

Salt & pepper

 

Basil Pesto

50g fresh basil leaves

1large clove garlic, crushed

1 tablespoon pine nuts

6 tablespoons of extra Virgin olive oil

25g grated Parmesan cheese

Salt

Add the basil leaves, garlic, pine nuts, olive oil to a mini blender with a pinch of salt and blend to a smooth purée. Place in a dish and stir in the Parmesan cheese. Hey presto you have pesto!

To cook.

Heat up oven to maximum temperature, push fire to back of oven. You want a roasting environment in the oven with a temperature around 200c

Toss the potatoes in the olive oil in a bowl and season with a good pinch of salt and pepper. Place potatoes rounds in a baking tin overlapping each other until you cover the base of the tin. Pour over any remaining olive oil that you have in the bowl. Place in oven and bake for around 12 minutes until they have softened and slightly browned. Make sure you turn the baking tin occasionally to ensure even cooking. Remove from the oven and place cod loins on top of potatoes and sprinkle with coarse sea salt. Return to the oven and bake for around 8 minutes. The fish should be nicely cooked and flake easily with a fork. About 5 to 6 minutes before the fish is cooked, place the cherry tomatoes on a baking sheet, drizzle with olive oil and place in the oven close to the fire so that the skins slightly split and char.

When ready serve fish and potatoes with cherry tomatoes and drizzle with pesto.

 

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Red currants are officially in season from July-September so we thought we’d make the most of them with this delicious wood fired dish. We have accompanied wood fired duck with a redcurrant relish – yum!

• 4 duck breasts (about 140g/ 5oz each)
• Pinch Chinese five-spice powder

For the relish you’ll need:

• 1 small red onion, chopped
• 1 small green apple, cored and chopped
• 1 fat garlic clove, chopped
• 1 tbsp chopped fresh root ginger
• 1 large fresh red chilli, chopped (optional)
• 2 tbsp olive oil
• 100ml red wine vinegar
• 2-3 tbsp light muscovado sugar
• 140g fresh or frozen red currants
• 2 tbsp balsamic vinegar

Start by firing up your wood fired oven to reach its optimum temperature. Keep the temperature high to brown/seal food items in the oven, follow this by covering with liquid or a lid then maintain oven above 200°C.

Gently fry the onion, apple, garlic, ginger and chilli, if using, in a pan with the oil until softened. Pour in the vinegar and bubble down until reduced by half. Add 100ml water and sugar to taste. Cook until reduced by two thirds and thickened. Stir in the red currants and balsamic vinegar, and cook for another 5 mins. The relish can be made up to a week ahead and stored in the fridge.

Using a sharp knife, slash the fat of the duck breasts in a criss-cross, cutting almost through to the flesh. Rub the skin with salt and five-spice powder.

Heat a wood fired ovenproof frying pan, until you can feel a gentle heat, then place the duck, skin-side down. Cook for 5 mins on a low to medium heat until the fat begins to melt. Spoon over the duck and season.

When the skin begins to brown and crisp, after about another 2 mins, tip out the excess fat. Flip over the breasts and cook for another 5 mins on the flesh side. This will give you medium-rare duck. If you prefer well done, cook for a further 3 mins or so. Remove from the heat; allow to stand for 5 mins then slice diagonally. Serve with watercress salad and the relish.

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We’ve gone and made rice pudding uber classy and ‘Brûleéd’ it! Impress your guests with this delicious summer evening desert that’s super easy to prepare and quick to cook in your wood fired oven using the residual heat left over from dinner!

You’ll need:

• 225g punnet strawberries, sliced
• 2 tbsp Cointreau
• 500g pack fresh rice pudding
• 85ml golden granulated sugar

Use the residual heat in your oven after cooking your main meal to brown off these little pots of heaven. Divide the strawberries between 6 ramekins, douse with Cointreau and top with the fresh rice pudding. Coat the tops with a good sprinkling of sugar and brown in your wood fired oven until lightly golden. Leave to settle for at least 5 minutes before serving – can be prepared prior to dinner (2 hours in advance).

 

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Basil is great all year round, but grows best during July and August so we have come up with this delicious wood fired dish to incorporate this in season herb! You know how we just can’t get enough of fresh produce, so save on packaging by buying a pot of basil from your garden centre or supermarket – it will live quite happily on a sunny windowsill and it’s also perfect for scattering over pizzas! Pizzas are the ultimate wood fired dish but we thought we’d try a little something different with the basil here. Get stuck in!

 You’ll need:

• 400g Jersey Royal, peeled, sliced finely
• 2 tbsp wholegrain mustard
• 140g asparagus (after snapping off woody ends)
• 140g Gruyère, coarsely grated
• 200g pot soured cream
• 1 large egg
• 1 pack of short crust pastry (or you could make your own)
• 1 large handful basil leaves
• 200ml/7fl oz light olive oil

If making your pastry, you’ll need:

• 175g block of butter, frozen
• 300g plain flour, plus extra for dusting
• 50g Gruyère, coarsely grated

Heat your wood fired oven to max temperature, let it cool to a baking environment of 250degrees C and maintain!

To make the pastry, put the flour in a big bowl and mix in a good pinch of salt and the cheese. Using a coarse cheese grater, grate in the butter – try to hold it as little as possible so it doesn’t warm up too much – and stir it in with a knife as you go. When all the butter is in, give it a final stir to make sure all the strands of butter are coated with flour, then quickly stir in 125ml of very cold water. Splash in a little more if it looks dry, then lightly bring the pastry together with your hands. Wrap in cling film and chill for at least 30 mins.

Roll out pastry into a circular or square shape – whatever takes your fancy – we went circular!

Brush the mustard over the pastry. Arrange the potatoes, asparagus and most of the Gruyère in layers in the centre of the base, leaving a border of pastry that’s roughly 5cm all the way around. Season and fold up the pastry edges to enclose the vegetables and cheese, pinching the edges to seal.

Blanch the basil in a large pan of salted boiling water for one minute, then drain and refresh in iced water. Squeeze out excess water from the basil with a tea towel. Put the leaves into a blender with the olive oil and blend for two minutes, or until the mixture is smooth and vibrantly green. Then strain through a fine sieve.

Whisk together the soured cream and the egg with a little seasoning, then pour into the centre of the tart. Sprinkle over the remaining cheese and slide the tart onto a baking tray. Bake in your wood fired oven until the pastry is golden and crisp. 

Serve warm with a drizzle of your delicious basil oil!

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Cavolo Nero also known as ‘Italian kale’ is in season now and we thought we’d include it in our recipe this week as it features in our seasonal produce guide this month. It is rich in nutrients, with high levels of iron and vitamins A-C. It’s dark green leaves, attractive crinkled appearance and sweet taste has made it a popular option for chefs looking for a more enticing alternative to better-known cabbage varieties. We’ve accompanied it with this spiced hake fish with creamy caper and butter sauce for the ultimate summer wood fired dish!

You’ll need:

For the Spiced Hake

• 1 tbsp sugar
• 1 tbsp salt
• 1 tsp curry powder
• 4 x 150-200g/5½-7oz hakesteaks
• 1 tbsp rapeseed oil
• 25g/1oz butter

For the caper and butter sauce

• 175ml/6fl oz dry white wine
• 2 tbsp double cream
• 200g/7oz butter
• 1 lemon, juice only
• 2 tbsp baby capers
• 1 tbsp chopped chives

For the Cavolo Nero

• 1 head black kale (cavolo nero)
• 25g/1oz butter
• Pinch grated nutmeg
• Pinch salt

Start by firing up your wood fired oven to it’s optimum temperature then allow the oven to cool down and maintain the temperature at 230 degrees C. For more information, please refer to our Cooking Techniques Guide.

Mix the sugar, salt and curry powder in a small bowl. Rub it over the flesh side of the fish and set aside for 5 minutes.

Add the double cream to a cast iron pan and heat to reduce in volume by two-thirds. Beat in the butter and season with lemon juice. Add the capers and chopped chives.

For the Cavolo Nero, bring a large pan of boiling salted water to the boil. Take the small inside leaves off the Cavolo Nero. Plunge into the boiling water then take out and drain. Melt the butter in a frying pan; add the kale and season with salt and nutmeg.

To cook the hake, heat rapeseed oil in a pan then add butter. When the butter is melted, add the fish skin-side down. Cook until golden-brown, then turn over and cook until the flesh is sealed and no longer translucent. Return to skin-side down and continue to fry until cooked through. Remove the fish from the pan and drain on kitchen paper.

Divide the Cavolo Nero between serving plates and put the fish on top then drizzle the creamy caper sauce all over it for ultimate yumminess!

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Welcome to this month’s instalment of ‘What’s In Season?’ – a monthly fruit and vegetable produce guide designed to inform and inspire! Here are just some of the many fruits and vegetables in season in the shops this summer month. Perfect ingredients for all those wood fired dishes!

Vegetables

Basil

Carrot

Cavolo Nero

Garlic

Lambs lettuce

      

Fruit

Cherry

Raspberry

Redcurrant

Watermelon

     

We hope you found this useful! Keep an eye out for the next instalment in August for the latest seasonal produce.

Please be sure to share your wood fired recipes with us and we will post them up as a guest recipe on our website! Email over your photos and recipes to info@stoneovenco.co.uk or Facebook or Tweet us your photos.

If you are interested in our residential oven range, visit our Primo, Mezzo and Vento pages for prices, information and technical drawings. Please don’t hesitate to contact the team on 0845 834 0252 should you have any further questions.

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Ta dah! We are delighted to announce George Henderson’s Mezzo 76 as June’s oven of the month!  Mr Henderson’s Mezzo 76 looks fantastic in the spring sunshine in its wonderful outdoor kitchen unit. We think it really is the worthy winner of this month’s best oven award.

Here is what Mr Henderson had to say:

“I just wanted to let you know we are delighted with our new Mezzo 76 oven (picture attached) that we installed last week. Our friends and family are all very impressed and we’ve had lots of fun already experimenting with some superb tasting pizzas and even an excellent fish soup recipe. The oven is bound to get lots of use this summer. We can’t wait.” 

“We are delighted to accept the oven of the month award! What an honour! It will make the pizzas taste even more delicious I’m sure! The oven has been a huge hit with our friends and family already – as it has with us. We are looking forward to enjoying many laughter-filled days in the summer gathering around the oven to enjoy, hopefully, many more tasty oven treats. So far our leek, pear, and blue cheese pizza has been a revelation, closely followed by a fabulous seafood soup. The pizza’s are hard to beat but we are preparing to try a tagine next, and also some bread.”

“The quality of the oven is top drawer, as was the service received from the Stone Bake Oven Company. We’ve already recommended you to many of our friends. A mention needs to go to our excellent carpenter, George Harrison, a highly skilled craftsman who worked diligently to complete the build. He’s helped us create an outdoor, social focal point that we intend to use to the full in the months to come.”

For your chance to win the title of Oven of the Month, simply send in your oven photographs and some feedback on your oven. Whether you are a new customer or purchased an oven from us a while ago, we want to hear from you. Send your photos to info@stoneovenco.co.uk – it’s as easy as that!

If you are interested in our residential oven range, visit our Primo, Mezzo and Vento pages for prices, information and technical drawings. Please don’t hesitate to contact the team on 0845 834 0252 should you have any further questions.

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Fennel is officially in season in June! Jazz up your side dishes with this fennel gratin – a tasty and perfect accompaniment to a wood fired fish dinner!

 

You’ll need:

• 4 large fennel bulbs
• pinch grated nutmeg
• 1 garlic clove, crushed
• 200ml double cream
• 50g parmesan (or vegetarian alternative)

Heat your wood fired oven to max temperature, let it cool to a baking environment at 250degrees C and maintain. Place a pan of salted water in to boil. Trim the fennel tops, then cut into wedges. Boil for 5-6 mins, then drain well. Arrange in a cast iron dish, season and sprinkle with nutmeg. Stir the garlic into the cream and pour over the fennel. Top with Parmesan and bake for 20 minutes until crisp and golden brown. Serve with your choice of fish for the perfect summery dish!

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Make it a wood fired Father’s day!

Father’s Day is just around the corner – in fact it’s this weekend! Is your Dad mad about food and all things pizza? Look no further; we’ve put some cracking, Stone Bakey gift ideas together for you!

Chocolate Pizza – OH YES!

Is your Dad a real chocoholic? Gourmet Chocolate Pizza have a Special Edition Fathers Day Pizza gift made from high quality Belgian milk chocolate and decorated with orange rainbow drops, milk chocolate curls, and finished off with a white chocolate plaque! It measures 7 inches in size and is presented in a pizza box, making the scrummiest Father’s Day gift idea for any chockie lover. The segments have already been indented, so it is easy to grab a slice on the onset of the munchies or for sharing with the rest of the family (you hope)!

 

Grow Your Own Chili & Basil Plants

The perfect thing for Dad’s who love to grow their own produce to cook with! These awesome little gift boxes include a packet of seeds and grow your own kit. Basil and chili’s are some of the perfect ingredients for awesome pizza making whether chopped and used for toppings or blitzed into tomato sauce! Get Stone Bake’s secret tomato sauce recipe right here.

Dad’s Tea/Coffee Mug

This one speaks for itself right?

Personalised Apron & Chopping Board

Is your Dad King of wood fired cooking? Let him know with this personalised apron and add your own message! Every pizza prep session requires a chopping board – get your Dad a personalised wooden board to use!

 

Italian Cheese Kit

This is an awesome Father’s day gift! Imagine their faces when your Dad serves up wood fired pizza with home made cheese toppings! Requiring no previous cheese-making experience whatsoever, this hand-crafted Italian Cheese Kit contains everything your Dad will need (apart from milk) to whip up Mozzarella, Ricotta, Mascarpone and more in just an hour for each cheese!

 

We hope this has given you some inspiration in the lead up to Father’s Day! We know what we’ll be getting our Dad’s now.

If you’re cracking out some wood fired cooking on Sunday, why not try some of our delicious dishes from our recipe page!

If you are interested in our residential oven range, visit our Primo, Mezzo and Vento pages for prices, information and technical drawings. Please don’t hesitate to contact the team on 0845 834 0252 should you have any further questions. 

• For all the latest Stone Bake news & updates be sure to follow us on Facebook,Twitter, Instagram and Pinterest!