So I got a Pizza oven.

Gosh what a comically 40-something thing to do I hear you say. Well, let me tell you a story of determination and resilience.

Hey Team,

I recently went through a brief process of psychometric testing, it turned up pretty much nothing I didn't already know about myself. Doggedly determined, much more competitive than you probably think, a thoughtful strategist who likes to take a long view on things.¹

The purpose of these assessments isn’t always focussed on identifying the thing, but acknowledging the thing².

I need to tell you about this pizza oven though. It’s one of these: Städler Made Outdoor Oven

Just look at it.

I’ve followed the guy on Instagram for about 2 years since he designed it, and I’ve wanted one since the second I saw them. 

Except I didn’t know how to make a pizza from scratch.

You kinda have to address the point here, which is that whatever you might think of pizza, I love ‘em. But I’m a bit of a purist. 

Obviously low intervention pizza is better than the commercially made stuff, but of course I’ve eaten store bought, entry level pizza. I’ve had all sorts of pizza, but I’m one of a minority who are a little bit fascinated by them.

Is the dough made from cauliflower? Yes? Not a Pizza.

Are the toppings frightfully elaborate? Not interested. 

Pizza ingredients:

• Flour, water, salt, yeast. 

• Tomato, mozzarella, Parmesan, basil, olive oil. 

• Maybe some salami.

• Fire.

Anyway, this pizza oven changed the game. We can all remember that first taste, sight of something cool that got us interested in pizza. I’ve tried and tried with home made, frying pan pizza, pizza stones and such, but it’s just never the same. I rarely eat a decent pizza at home because they're always a disappointment. 

Learn to do it properly first.

The psychometric stuff also said that I quite like being the knowledgeable one, ‘The Expert’.

There is a long game here, and it’s a principle I’ve held for a while, “get good at something before you buy all the expensive gear”³.

For whatever reason, whether it's because I respond well to challenges or not, I decided to convince myself that I had to get very good at making pizza dough, from scratch. Ideally sourdough with a wild yeast starter, before getting my hands on the oven.

Which meant going back to basics and getting a grip on sourdough bread. Did I mention this is a project that I started back in June 2023?

With a slightly bored and free summer after sitting the MW stage 2 exam, I needed something else to study, and that became bread. 

The plan was:

1. July - Get good at sourdough bread. 

2. August - buy Pizza oven.

3. September - Pizza made from scratch and a Garden Pizza Party.

I bought some kit.

That June, every day for a month, I diligently fed a jar of flour and water, more flour and water, scraped it into a paste and left it on the side to do essentially nothing. I’ve spent more money on diluting locally made, organic wholewheat flour with water than I have on pizza in the last year. 

By the end of July I’d managed to get it going, billowing up, bubbling and providing the base yeast for the dough.

Did you know… The temperature of the room, the ratio of flour to water, the type of flour and the size of the jar all have an impact on the growth of this little jar of gloop?

It’s still going today. It mostly lives in the fridge now, and we have a much healthier work / life balance together. 

I bought a book. 

This yeast forms the basis of sourdough bread I needed⁴ to master before getting my head around making pizza dough. My first loaf was July 2023, a fucking disaster.

The nice guy, Maurizio from The Perfect Loaf book, told me what to do. His YouTube videos make it look a lot easier than it is. I made a loaf every couple of weeks for most of the winter. 

The thing they don’t tell you about sourdough bread it that it takes fucking ages. You feed the starter the night before, make the dough for essentially most of the next day; stirring and folding and proofing and shaping. Whack it in the fridge overnight, and bake it the next-next day. I don't often get two full days at home to dedicate to baking one single loaf of bread. 

I persevered. Cue a Montage. 

The ratio of water changed, the flour changed, the ratio of wholewheat evolved, the stretching got easier, the number of folds began to make sense, I got comfy with sticky, the proofing felt like I could predict it, the dough started to rise as expected, the shaping got easier, I bought a proper scraper, a new set of scales, I got some wood pulp bannetons⁵, I started using a big old pot as a Dutch oven.

The winter deadline of Garden Pizza Party passed surprisingly quickly.

I felt so much more in tune with bread. By March 2024 I was pretty happy with my ability to knock out a pretty smart loaf of crunchy, pillowy sourdough though.

Spring 2024.

My plan was to concentrate, study hard, practice, practice, practice and get on with things, so I could head into this summer with the tastiest possible “elaborate cheese on toast”. 

The actual acquisition of the pizza oven in the end came from my delightful grandma⁶. She’s 88(?), and no matter what I do, I’ll have done OK in her eyes.

So, regardless of whether I was ready to make a decent pizza, she took it upon herself to trust in my hard work and fund it upfront, on the promise that I would make her one. 

The delivery date was set for July.

Forgot to mention that they come as a flat pack self-build from Denmark. That took a few hours in the garden with much more hammering and swearing that my calm and thoughtful personality suggests I’d normally show. 

The First Pizza

Two weeks ago, I finally made a batch of ‘00’ flour, slow fermented pizza dough. Much more kneading involved than bread, more gluten, more protein, a longer ambient ferment, a quicker rise, temperature is more important. My niece and nephew are less interested in the ratio of flour to salt to water to starter.

The oven, as you can see from the photo up top is based on an open fire, made from proper kiln dried logs and kindling, and keeping this at the right temperature is important. 

The pushing out and stretching of the dough is important. The specific moisture of the mozzarella is important. The quality of the sieved tomatoes is important. 

I finally cooked and ate a pizza last week that started life as a little jar of sourdough starter in July 2023, through a process of trial, error, learning, perseverance, resilience, and determination.  

Of course Pizza is Wine.

Of course I approach them both in the same way.  

After 3 years, countless blind tastings, practice exams and lots of hard work, and 8 exams in 4 days, my MW exam results come out in 1 month.

1. Also, according to my numerical reasoning assessment it’s 89% likely that I’m better than you at percentages. 

2. On the other hand, it’s unlikely that you’ll struggle too much to find a waffle, wordy sentence, that veers off topic with a typo in it somewhere in this newsletter, that’s according to my verbal reasoning assessment anyway.

3. Honestly, I live by it. 

4. Kneaded, heh.

5. Thanks to Shona from Elsing Bakehouse. 

6. Generally known as ‘gramble’