{"id":1240,"date":"2017-10-26T10:26:52","date_gmt":"2017-10-26T10:26:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.wood-firedoven.co.uk\/?p=1240"},"modified":"2023-06-30T09:27:48","modified_gmt":"2023-06-30T09:27:48","slug":"fascinating-history-wood-fired-ovens","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.wood-firedoven.co.uk\/fascinating-history-wood-fired-ovens\/","title":{"rendered":"FASCINATING 2000YR HISTORY OF WOOD FIRED OVENS"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"History<\/a>
Baker’s wood-fired oven in Pompeii buried in AD79 after the eruption of Vesuvius<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

<\/h4>\n

<\/h4>\n

<\/h4>\n

<\/h4>\n

<\/h4>\n

<\/h4>\n

<\/h4>\n

<\/h4>\n

<\/h4>\n

<\/h4>\n

<\/h4>\n

<\/h4>\n

<\/h4>\n

A potted history of <\/strong>Wood-fired ovens-\u00a0<\/strong><\/h4>\n

We stand in a long tradition of wood-fired oven designing and building going back to remains found at the Roman city of Pompeii, near modern Naples, Italy. Wood-fired ovens in various forms, mostly unfired clay, probably existed for thousands of years before but the existing ovens have given us a model for construction and design detail that has been built on and refined over succeeding generations.<\/p>\n

\"Drawing<\/a>
Drawing of typical wood-fired bakery oven<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Wood-fired ovens can be found in every culture that has access to natural fuel as a resource and grain as a food. The building materials used vary from region to region but one thing they have in common is their refractory nature; they hold heat for extended periods without degrading, enabling successive batches of bread to be cooked on one heating cycle. Today, modern high alumina clays and crushed firebrick are formed into shapes, brick, tile or segment, and fired to give a stable product resistant to temperatures up to 1700C. These form the basis of brick built ovens.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Advances in refractory cement have led to the development of a new generation of oven core, one that has the same heat holding capacity as brick but in a modular form that is convenient to handle and build without any specialist skills.<\/p>\n

The Italians have led the way in making these quick-fire ovens accessible to millions of people worldwide whilst the French have kept to traditional low vaulted high mass masonry ovens which are suited to both bread and pizza and make superb, very adaptable cooking environments.<\/p>\n

\"FourFollowing this tradition, Four Grand-Mere ovens<\/a> are well insulated with two or more layers of high density ceramic fibre as opposed to thick layers of sand or salt found in historic bakery ovens.<\/p>\n

By using modern high performance refractory materials, the oven mass can be reduced from several bricks thick to a mere 60-100mm. There is a trade off as the old high mass ovens relied on the heat soaking through the whole structure with firings taking as long as 3-4 hours sometimes longer and once soaked, the oven would cool slowly enabling batches of bread to be baked before needing to fire again. Firing times for modern well insulated ovens are down to 1-2 hours and keep the heat almost as well if the mouth and flue can be isolated with an insulated door and a damper.<\/p>\n