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Build your own earth oven : a low-cost, wood-fired mud oven, simple sourdough bread, perfect loaves / Kiko Denzer, with Hannah Field.

By: Contributor(s): Material type: TextTextPublication details: Blodgett, OR : Hand Print Press, c2007.Edition: Third editionDescription: i, 132 pages, [8] pages of plates : illustrations (some color) ; 26 cmContent type:
  • text
Media type:
  • unmediated
Carrier type:
  • volume
ISBN:
  • 9780967984674
  • 096798467X
Other title:
  • Earth oven
  • Low-cost, wood-fired mud oven, simple sourdough bread, perfect loaves
Subject(s):
Contents:
"Revised, expanded, updated"--Cover. -Includes bibliographical references (p. 122-124) and index.
Holdings
Item type Current library Collection Call number Status Date due Barcode Item holds
Non-Fiction Davis (Central) Library Non-Fiction Non-Fiction 641.815 DEN Available T00489707
Total holds: 0

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

Earth ovens combine the utility of a wood-fired, retained-heat oven with the ease and timeless beauty of earthen construction. Building one will appeal to bakers, builders, and beginners of all kinds, from:

* the serious or aspiring baker who wants the best low-cost
bread oven, to
* gardeners who want a centerpiece for a beautiful
outdoor kitchen, to
* outdoor chefs, to
* creative people interested in low-cost materials and
simple technology, to
* teachers who want a multi-faceted, experiential project for students of all ages (the book has been successful with
 everyone from third-graders to adults).

Build Your Own Earth Oven is fully illustrated with step-by-step directions, including how to tend the fire, and how to make perfect sourdough hearth loaves in the artisan tradition. The average do-it-yourselfer with a few tools and a scrap pile can build an oven for free, or close to it. Otherwise, $30 should cover all your materials--less than the price of a fancy "baking stone." Good building soil is often right in your back yard, under your feet. Build the simplest oven in a day! With a bit more time and imagination, you can make a permanent foundation and a fire-breathing dragon-oven or any other shape you can dream up.

Earth ovens are familiar to many that have seen a southwestern "horno" or a European "bee-hive" oven. The idea, pioneered by Egyptian bakers in the second millennium BCE, is simplicity itself: fill the oven with wood, light a fire, and let it burn down to ashes. The dense, 3- to 12-inch-thick earthen walls hold and store the heat of the fire, the baker sweeps the floor clean, and the hot oven walls radiate steady, intense heat for hours.

Home bakers who can't afford a fancy, steam-injected bread oven will be delighted to find that a simple earth oven can produce loaves to equal the fanciest "artisan" bakery. It also makes delicious roast meats, cakes, pies, pizzas, and other creations. Pizza cooks to perfection in three minutes or less. Vegetables, herbs, and potatoes drizzled with olive oil roast up in minutes for a simple, elegant, and delicious meal. Efficient cooks will find the residual heat useful for slow-baked dishes, and even for drying surplus produce, or incubating homemade yogurt.

"Revised, expanded, updated"--Cover.

Includes bibliographical references (p. 122-124) and index.

"Revised, expanded, updated"--Cover. -Includes bibliographical references (p. 122-124) and index.

11 13 19 20 22 89 96 135 147 180

Table of contents provided by Syndetics

  • Foreword
  • Seven arguments for mud
  • Preface(s)
  • Introduction
  • Site prep, design, materials, & tools
  • Steps to an oven
  • Structural cob & other sculpture
  • Using your oven
  • Simple sourdough bred
  • Principles for burning
  • Oven variations
  • Troubleshooting & follow-up
  • Afterword: Earth, ovens, art

Reviews provided by Syndetics

Library Journal Review

What could be more satisfying than building your own earth oven and baking your own bread? Sculptor Denzer (Dig Your Hands into the Dirt) and baker Field here sing the praises of doing it all yourself. This revision of their 1979 classic (which was also revised in 1998) includes a large gallery of photos of their completed and decorative ovens. With the help of simplistic and crude drawings, the two explain in detail the materials and techniques used when building earth ovens, taking into consideration site and safety issues. Construction is complex, though lots of options are given for alternative materials and designs. It is only regrettable that despite the range of the handmade ovens presented, only one bread recipe is given. For larger collections or where there is interest. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

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