Okay, so I’ve been wanting to build a pizza oven for, like, forever. Finally got around to it this past weekend, and let me tell you, it was a journey. The whole thing started with the bricks, obviously. You can’t have a pizza oven without the right bricks.
First, I spent ages just staring at different kinds of bricks online. Regular house bricks? Nope, gotta be firebricks. But then there are different types of firebricks! Who knew? I finally settled on some medium-duty ones that seemed like a good balance of heat retention and, you know, not costing a fortune.
Getting the bricks was a whole other adventure. I called up a bunch of local building supply places. Most of them looked at me like I had three heads when I asked for firebricks. Finally, I found one place that had them, but they were way out in the boonies. Loaded up the truck, drove for what felt like hours, and hauled those heavy suckers back home. My back was definitely not happy with me.
The Building Begins
Then came the actual building part. I’d sketched out a rough plan, a simple dome shape. Laying that first course of bricks was nerve-wracking. I mixed up the mortar, which is not your typical stuff, it needed to be heat resistant, too. Slapped some on, placed the brick, tapped it into place with a mallet. Repeat, repeat, repeat.
- Mixing mortar
- Laying bricks
- Cussing a lot
- Re-laying bricks
- Realized I was bad at this
- Called a friend for help
- Worked on it for 5 days
Slowly but surely, the oven started to take shape. It was messy, my hands were covered in mortar, and I definitely made some mistakes along the way. But, seeing that dome slowly rising up, brick by brick, was pretty satisfying. I even got the kids involved a little, letting them hand me bricks and feel like they were part of the project.
Almost There
It took a good few days, but eventually, the dome was finished. I left a little opening in the front, of course, for putting the pizzas in. Then, I had to let the whole thing cure for a while. That was the hardest part, just waiting and hoping I hadn’t messed something up royally. I lit a small fire inside just to test it out, and it seemed to hold up!
Finally, the big day arrived. We made some pizza dough, prepped all the toppings, and fired up that oven. It took a while to get the temperature right, but once it did, that first pizza slid right in. The smell of baking dough and melting cheese was amazing.
And you know what? That pizza tasted better than any pizza I’ve ever had. Maybe it was the satisfaction of building the oven myself, or maybe it was just the magic of cooking with fire. Either way, it was a total win. Totally worth all the sweat, and maybe a few swear words, along the way. Now, who wants pizza?
