We can’t get enough of all the lovely comments and feedback we get from our customers after they have their ovens up and running.

Alan Morris recently purchased a Primo 60 from us and was kind enough to send through some photos and some brilliantly descriptive feedback all about his experience with The Stone Bake Oven Company. We thought that others may be interested in hearing all about it, so read on for Alan Morris’ wood fired oven experience…

Hello all,

Having researched wood burning ovens on the internet by the comfort of my settee I decided that yours were the best for me plus had the best reviews. I was torn on which oven to purchase but as my garden is not the largest I decided to opt for the Primo 60. I made use of your special offer for the free paddles plus added the electronic temperature gauge along with the weather sealant, and metal stand. The beauty of your stand is that I can move the oven if I need to move it to a better location. Having ordered the oven, stand and all the other goodies I read the benefit of placing your Calcium Silicate board to improve the heat retention in the floor of the oven for baking etc. I then further ordered this board a few days later to complete the package. All the items arrived together which was excellent. 

I purchased some cement board fro my local builders merchants in fact it was an aqua panel which is waterproof so will keep in the garden exposed to any elements without any problem. The Calcium Silicate Board and cement board was easy to cut and trim just like normal plasterboard so getting it to sit in your oven stand recess was a very easy task. I covered the entire edges of the Calcium Silicate board with PVA to give it a waterproof membrane. 

I have to say the crate that the oven arrives in was amazing, very well made with good quality timber. I carefully dismantled the crate completely housing the oven stand plus making a front door where my wood is stored along with two shelves. I even reused all your screws!  Once the oven stand was levelled clad in your wood I treated the wood in green wood preserve to match the remainder of our garden fences. I treated the oven dome with two coats of your frost sealant over three days allowing it to dry between coats. 

 

My wife and I were able to lift and fit the oven base onto the oven stand where I further sealed the edges with a log burner chimney seal in black which matches the oven and now makes the Calcium Silicate fully weather proof.  With the aid of my son and next door neighbour the oven dome was placed easily onto the oven floor. The chimney was pressed into place and hey presto, our wood burning oven project was finished and makes a nice feature in my garden.

I waited a couple of days before lighting the oven, we had some rain over night where I noticed the rain water rolled off the dome due to the weatherproof sealant like water on a waxed car bonnet. My first cooking day was last Saturday where we cooked one of your recipes the wood burning Beer Can Chicken with all the trimmings, roast potatoes and vegetables. We were very pleased with our first attempt, your oven will be a great asset to our family, we have functions planned by entertaining our cycle club plus our family when our first grandchild is born in a few weeks time.

The oven will not make oven of the month but to us it is an asset and will be the hub of many social evenings.

Alan Morris

Leicestershire

We hoped you enjoyed this blog post and getting an insight into the positive experience that we strive for each and every one of our customers to have. And for the record Mr Morris, you are definitely in the running for Oven Of The Month due to your super inspiring use of the wooden crate which has landed you with a really smart and unique finish to your oven…watch this space!

If you have an experience to share, we’d love to hear from you. Email us on info@stoneovenco.co.uk. We look forward to hearing from you!

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It’s the time of year to make the most of all those seasonal pumpkins and squashes around! This spicy little number is sure to keep you warm and cosy this winter.

• ½ kg pumpkin or squash, peeled and roughly chopped
• 4 tsp sunflower oil
• 1 onion, sliced
• 1 tbsp grated ginger
• 1 lemongrass, bashed a little
• 3-4 tbsp Thai red curry paste
• 400ml can coconut milk
• 850ml vegetable stock
• lime juice and sugar, for seasoning

Start by firing up your wood fired oven to it’s optimum temperature and allow the oven to cool down to a roasting environment. Maintain the temperature at 200 degrees C. For more information, please refer to our Cooking Techniques Guide.

Toss the pumpkin or squash in a roasting tin with half the oil and seasoning, then roast for 30 mins until golden and tender.

Meanwhile, put the remaining oil in a pan with the onion, ginger and lemongrass. Gently cook for 8-10 mins until softened. Stir in the curry paste for 1 min, followed by the roasted pumpkin, all but 3 tbsp of the coconut milk and the stock. Bring to a simmer, cook for 5 mins, then fish out the lemongrass. Cool for a few mins, then whizz until smooth with a hand blender, or in a large blender in batches. Return to the pan to heat through, season with salt, pepper, lime juice and sugar. Serve drizzled with the remaining coconut milk and scattered with chilli (if you like it spicy) and pumpkin seeds for decoration!

 

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During this time of year, the Stone Bake team begin to review the busy summer months that have just passed and start to plan for the next, ensuring it’s bigger and better than the last! It’s a very small window of time but it allows us to improve, develop and grow Stone Bake to its full potential. This might be as big a task as taking on another member of staff to cope with office demands or something as small as tweaking the wording of a line in one of our manuals to help better explain ourselves. All these things are so important for us as we are always wanting to be the best we can be for potential new customers, existing customers and loyal followers alike. So let us tell you about a little, but very exciting, twist we have introduced to the recipe section on our site.

We were noticing that more and more of our foodie friends, whether they be wood fired oven customers or just avid followers of Stone Bake on social media, were sharing photos of what they had been cooking up in their wood fired ovens and some of them were truly inspiring ideas. Whether it was a unique pizza topping, a new cooking style or a family favourite recipe, you guys were making us drool at our desks! It seemed a shame to just simply re-tweet your photo or reply with a simple ‘thank you’ when you were proving just as good, (if anything, a little better!) at coming up with unique recipes than we at Stone Bake are!

As a result, we took it upon ourselves to start inviting customers to provide us with their recipes to go alongside their awesome photos and the feedback has been great so far with many of you keen to get involved. You will see that we have added a category on our recipe section called ‘Guest Recipe’ and all recipes linked to this category can be identified with a snazzy green tag. What’s more – these recipes are now available for everyone to see, share, try and enjoy. Click here for a direct link and select ‘Guest Recipe as your category in the drop down when you hover your mouse over the ‘Recipes’ symbol. Think of it as a collaborative recipe book that is free for all to use – perfect!

We are going to aim to post a guest recipe once a month but we can’t do that without your help! We are calling out to all our Stone Baker’s to get involved. If you want to see your favourite wood fired recipe feature on our website, simply send us your recipe along side a few photographs of the recipe in progress and the finished result to info@stoneovenco.co.uk and we will be sure to get it posted! Happy cooking and we look forward to hearing from you!

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After fitting two of our Gozney Professional Ovens into Bosco’s kitchen a couple of months ago, I simply had to head to Bristol to see the results of all their hard work and determination.

During the planning process I met the Bosco team and spent some time with Jake, the head chef. Jake told me all about the teams many creative ideas for the restaurant which they have successfully put into practice! Their ideas and concepts for the restaurant were made a reality in the forms of sourcing the very best cured meats from the heart of Italy, having a meat presentation fridge, two large ovens on display and two professional Piziolos from Naples in the kitchen.

It was so great to see all their hard work paying off after the time we have spent working with the Bosco team to aid them in their oven selection and dough development process, all the while learning a lot from them, and them from us.

Now, I’ve been to many a pizza joint, and I’m pretty fussy but I was completely bowled over with the lively vibe and design of the restaurant. These guys are definitely all they’re cracked up to be. It was a Friday night and the restaurant was bustling!

With Miles, the owner and founder of Bosco Pizzeria and his wife Charlie, we had a bar seat overseeing all the pizza chef action. Watching the pizza cook before our eyes in our G120 ovens was just awesome! It was a front row seat to all the food creations, the smells were insane and I could not wait to taste it all!

   

I tried the Sicilian style octopus cooked in our very own Gozney Oven, Roman style artichokes, Coppa Stagionato, Lardo (cured meats), Emilia Romagna Pizza, for dessert Zeppole (bit like dough nuts) and the poached bitter chocolate cake. What can I say apart from wow, it was foodie heaven and totally amazing!

Bosco have just got it right, from their big friendly team to their great atmosphere and design, with a clear view of the open kitchen. You can clearly see the amount of care and attention that is taken by Jake the head chef.

All in all it was amazing and I can’t recommend it highly enough! Check out some of their rocking reviews here on Trip Advisor and check out this video of the chef’s in action! Bosco Video

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The very worthy winner of this month’s best oven is Roshi Saul! His mosaic, hand tiled Primo 60 is just amazing – we love it!

When I asked Roshi how he went about the design and how he got the idea behind the peacock pattern, he told us all:

“I decided on a peacock design because my parents were from Sri Lanka, and the peacock is often used as a cultural motif there.  I also thought it would be quite eye catching!”

“I do a lot of mosaics, so now I know that the way to approach it is to be as ambitious as possible, and not to be too daunted by the task. What I always remind myself is:  the design always looks brilliant after it has been grouted.  I drew the picture straight on to the oven, and used it as a basic guideline.  I then worked out the colours for the feathers, and the tiles I would use, and it came together nicely. I kept referring back to a photograph of a peacock, which is where the detailing came from.  It took a few weeks, on and off, to complete: there are two peacocks, one on each side.  The background was laborious, but there’s something very therapeutic about mosaicking.  Finally, I finished it with a frost resistant grout.  When I washed it down and polished it up, it looked fabulous.”

“It was all so worth it and the oven stays warm for hours longer, now it’s been insulated.”

The care and time Roshi took to create the final look of his oven really makes him a worthy winner and his beautiful Primo 60 just had to be crowned as October’s oven of the month!

 

 

 

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We love to make use of the seasonal produce in the supermarkets and as we’ve just had the first day of Autumn, it won’t be long before pumpkins take over the vegetable aisles! Taking advantage of this, but in keeping with everyone’s favourite snack to cook in a wood fired oven, here is an autumnal pizza recipe!

Ingredients:

• Pizza dough
• 1 x Small butternut squash or pumpkin
• 2 x Garlic cloves
• 1 x Handful of parmesan cheese
• 1 x Handful of your favourite cheese
• A bunch of sage
• Nutmeg
• Olive oil
• Salt and pepper

Method:

1. Bring your wood fired oven up to optimum temperature and allow it to cool down to approximately 250 – 300 degrees C.

2. Prepare your pizza dough – we know a great recipe 😉

3. Whilst your pizza dough is proving, prepare the pumpkin or squash by peeling, de-seeding and slicing it into thin slices.

4. Place the slices into a cast iron roasting tray, drizzle with olive oil, crushed garlic and salt and pepper then place into your oven to roast for around 20 minutes or until the edges start to brown. Keep your oven door ‘half in, half out’ during this time to keep heat within the oven.

5. Whilst the pumpkin or squash is roasting, knock out your dough ball(s) onto a floured pizza peel ready for topping.

6. Lay your favourite cheese straight onto the pizza dough. Ricotta works great with this recipe!

7. Layer on the roasted pumpkin/squash slices and sage leaves and finish everything off with a healthy glug of olive oil, salt and pepper, grated parmesan and grated nutmeg.

8. Bring your oven back up to optimum temperature by adding more wood to the fire. Perfect pizza cooking temperature is between 400-450 degree C. Insert your pizza into the oven.

9. Cook for 1-2 minutes until the crust has risen and the sage has crisped, ensuring you are turning the pizza regularly.

10. Cut into slices, get stuck in and enjoy!

TOP TIP – Sprinkle some of your pumpkin’s seeds over the pizza befire cooking in the oven for extra crunch!

We’re encouraging you to get wood fired cooking over the autumn/winter months with this scrumptious winter warmer – Treat yourself, it’s too yummy not to try!

For the fruit

• 4 Bramley apples, peeled, cored and sliced
• 300g (10oz) frozen dark fruit – we use blackberries/blueberries
• 1tsp ground cinnamon
• ½tsp ground cloves
• 2tbsp sugar

For the crumble

• 100g (4oz) plain flour
• 85g (3½oz) unsalted butter, chilled and cubed
• 100g (4oz) blanched whole almonds
• 4tbsp caster sugar
• A couple of pinches of demerara sugar

Start by firing up your wood fired oven to it’s optimum temperature and allow the oven to cool down to a baking environment. Maintain the temperature at 150 degrees C. For more information, please refer to our Cooking Techniques Guide.

Put the apples, dark fruit, spices and sugar into a bowl and toss everything together. Transfer to a greased 1.7l (3pt) baking dish.

Put the flour, butter and almonds into a food processor. Pulse briefly to form a mixture that resembles breadcrumbs. Stir in the sugar and spoon the mixture over the fruit. Lightly sprinkle the demerara sugar over the top for that added extra scrum factor!

Place the dish on a baking sheet and put in your wood fired oven for 30 to 40 minutes until the fruit bubbles and the crumble is deliciously golden brown on top.

Serve with a hot vanilla custard and commence the tummy pleasing face feeding!

 

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Here at Stone Bake HQ, we love nothing more than welcoming our friends, customers, locals (anyone really !) into our training kitchen to join us for pizza eating, discussions and cooking ! As a business of ‘foodies’ its a natural offering for all the team..

So, it was really exciting to have Mike & Pat Smith, (Mezzo 76 owners) and John, from West Dorset Foodies down this Saturday for one of Toms VIP Master Classes.

With the weather turning outside and the rain firmly setting in, fresh coffee, Orange juice and fresh Croissants kicked off what promised to be a Fun morning of learning with fellow foodies !  With Tom, sharing his expertise on everything from Wood Fired Cooking to Dough recipes and toppings, it was great to see everyone getting involved and having a go at making and cooking their own pizzas..

 

Tom is constantly tweaking and improving his dough recipe in search of the perfect mix, (we think its pretty wonderful already!  ) We hope Mike and Pat took away some useful information from Toms Master class, and get to put his secret dough recipe to good use in their Mezzo soon, between the October showers of course.

We hope to be rolling our Master classes out soon to our lovely Stone Bake followers, keep your eyes peeled for further information, in the meantime, check out West Dorset Foodies Blog, and website, Thank you John for joining us and for your fantastic Blog posts.

 

 

 

We are constantly updating our website with fresh and seasonal new recipe ideas, we’d love to hear your ideas too !  For more information on our range of residential, or commercial ovens please give us a call and one of the team will be happy to help advise you.

0845 834 0252

info@stoneovenco.co.uk

And just like that, another blink-and-you’ll-miss-it summer is under our belts and Autumn is firmly upon us. Before we turn our heads and Christmas appears, we thought we’d drop you a post to give you some tips and tricks on how you can switch up your outdoor eating space. We aim to take you from Summer to Autumn with just a few, easy tweaks that’ll have you reaching for your favorite chunky knit jumper and comfy boots and braving the garden once more!

  

 

• Creating an Autumn Atmosphere

Your eating space throughout summer was most likely understated and simple – allowing the natural sunlight to do it’s magical thing and make everything and everyone look as though they are meant to be there. However, as the fresher weather approaches the transition in temperature can make it harder to convince your friends and family to sit outside, no matter how good your pizza cooking skills are! It is essential therefore to make sure the space is warm and inviting. A couple of easy additions will make the world of difference in creating a super-cozy autumnal haven…

Warm white or yellow fairly lights strung around your outdoor space (not too close to your oven of course!) will automatically make what might initially feel like a chilly early evening into an inviting and comfortable place for your guests to spend the evening.

Another autumnal addition that’ll warm up the appearance of your garden are lanterns and tea lights. Whether they hang from poles in the garden, are strung along a washing line or sit upon your table, they will immediately add warmth to any setting. Gardencentres and homeware shops are heaving with cute outdoor and indoor lanterns, big and small that can be taken to the next level of cozy by adding a simple tea light candle

Fairy lights and lanterns a bit too twee for you? Some classic pillar candles in a variety of shapes and sizes plonked onto a simple slate will do exactly the same job with minimum effort. What’s best is the messier the candle wax gets the better they look – it’s a gift that keeps on giving!

• Perfect Place Settings and Centrepieces 

If you are taking things a little more formal and looking for ways to jazz up your dinner party table, there are so many Autumn place setting ideas that are so easy to implement – you can even get the kids involved!

Think pinecones, conkers, twigs, acorns and dry leaves. Either whack them all in a bowl for an effortless centrepiece or use the individual items to dress each person’s place setting. Slate and chalk form the perfect name label and rustic twine is perfect to hold together cutlery and a napkin.

Whether it’s Halloween or not, pumpkins are a perfect, inexpensive addition to autumn centerpieces. Now offered in a whole range of shapes, sizes and colours you can really go to town in your local supermarket. Our favorites are the baby pumpkins or ‘munchkins’.

                

• Food Glorious Food!

Of course it wouldn’t be a Stone Bake blog post with out a little nod to our favourite thing – FOOD! With a change of season comes a change of food available in the shops. We particularly like to make use of the awesome root veg available in the supermarkets and using the residual heat of our wood fired ovens to roast them up. Beetroot, squash, parsnips, carrots – whatever you like!

Make the most of Halloween pumpkins in the shops. Top your pizzas with pumpkin flesh and sage or even bake a pumpkin pie in the oven using a baking temperature with your oven door in place.

Want something sweet to warm your cockles on a fresh Autumn evening? The residual heat in our wood fired ovens is perfect for baked apples. Simply pop your cored cooking apples in a large dish and sprinkle with brown sugar, cinnamon and sultanas allowing the ingredients to fall down the hollow core. Bake until the skin begins to slide off the apple, serve with ice cream and dig in!

 

We hope these tips help you and hopefully encourage you to make the most of your outdoor entertaining spaces despite the change in weather! We’ve made an Autumn Dining Ideas Pinterest board for some further pictures and inspiration. If you take on any of these tips, we’d love to see your photos!

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

 

A wonderful guest recipe from Joe & Mary Gallagher – simply delicious!

“The oven is the centrepiece of our outside kitchen and it has proved to be so popular with our family and friends that we are now having more parties than ever.”

Ingredients

• 1 Large Chicken
• 1 440ml Can of Cider
• 4 Large Potatoes cut into small chunks
• 2 Quartered Eating Apples
• 1 Large Onion
• 2 Cloves of Garlic
• 3 Sprigs of Rosemary
• 3 Sprigs of Thyme
• Olive Oil
• Salt and Pepper

Method

Heat the oven to approx. 250* C and as the fire dies down push the coals to the back of the oven.

In the meantime, in a suitable roasting tray, lay a layer of coarsely chopped onions and garlic together with the rosemary and thyme sprigs.

Prepare the chicken by rubbing into the skin sea salt and olive oil and season with ground pepper. Next insert the opened can of cider into the cavity of the chicken and stand the chicken up in the roasting tray. Lay the potatoes and apples around the chicken, on top of the onions, and pour over a little olive oil.

Place the tray in the oven at approx. 225* C, we leave the door open, and leave to roast for approx. 1.5 hrs turning the tray every 20 mins to ensure even cooking. We have found that we need to add a little more wood to the fire once or twice throughout cooking to maintain the temp at around 180*C.

After 1.5 hrs check the chicken by inserting a small knife into the thigh. If the juice runs clear the chicken is cooked.

Most of the cider will have evaporated and been absorbed by the chicken making it incredibly moist and beautifully flavoured.

Take the chicken out of the tray to set aside to rest. Remove the potato, onion and apple mix and set aside in a warm place. Remove the can from the chicken and pour any remaining cider into the tray. Stir with the residual juices in the tray and use to pour over the carved chicken and serve with the potato, onion and apple mix.

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