would appreciate guidance re bakerspride and bakepartner

[c8rvette]

Hi,

i would like a high temp home pizza oven where i can control the top and bottom temperatures individually. I cranked my home electric up past 800 ala varasano, and got some amazing results, but it scared the crap out of me, so i put the oven back to normal. But i guess not too surprisingly I have not been able to get anywhere near that great flavor now that i am cooking at 550.

Bakepartner has a home oven that goes up to 932F, the PM 451ED-1 with the high temp option:

http://www.bakepartner.com/CT450/models.html


and bakerspride has this one that goes up to 800F:

http://www.bakerspride.com/products-superdeck-e.asp

I dont know if there any other high temperature home electric pizza ovens, or if these are the only two. I think i will define high temp as over 700 degrees.

I have seen a post by scott123 warning against getting the bakepartner, i think because of the lame electric element. I will find out if the high temp version has a better element. If it does have a good electric element, then which is the better choice. The bakepartner only has a .8 inch stone. The bakerspride has 1".
The bake partner has 5.42 kw, and the bakerspride has

I am also considering the bakepartner PM721, which is more comparable to the bakerspride 3836 in price and abilities (both about 6 to 7 thousand dollars, whereas the 451ED-1 is $3240 + $780 for the stand):

http://www.bakepartner.com/pm700/models.html

But the PM721 is not a countertop model and so they said it is not UL certified for home use. The countertop versions like the 451ED-1 are only now finishing home UL certification. All the information is according to christer at bakepartner.

I am guessing if i got with the bakers pride that i will not miss the extra 132 degrees, but who knows, maybe there is some better taste to be found at those temps.. it would nice to have the ability to experiment up there.. and of course it would be more neapolitan-ish perhaps.

I also would be interested in any bbq grill based solutions where i can cook at  700 degrees or more, and control the bottom and top temperatures individually, at least to some extent.

thanks for any tips - mark

[barryvabeach]

Mark,  I don't know anything about the ones you linked to, but as Scott said in another post, brands are not as important as other factors - such as heating elements.   As for as bbq,   I am not aware of any retail products that gives accurate control over top and bottom heat.  If you check the threads here in the last few days, there are a number of products offered to put on a grill and some methods to "somewhat" impact the top heat, often by using a less conductive bottom stone, or vent at the top.   I did some experimenting with a Weber Summit,  and didn't play with it too long, but the stock IR burner put out way too much heat the few times I tried it, and I wasn't interested in spinning the pie every few seconds to keep the back from burning. .

[scott123]

Mark, I have to admit, my previous condemnation of the 451 was a knee jerk reaction to a trend for oven manufacturers to cut corners with countertops, combined with some quick math.  I took the 451ED-1's 5.42 kW, divided it by it's 3 elements, came up with 1.8 kW per element and wrote it off in comparison to the 4 kW (8 kW/2) per element in the Baker's Pride.

The math wasn't wrong, I just didn't do enough of it.  I put some more time in crunching the numbers and, per square inch, the 451ED-1 is 5.5 watts and the EP-1-8-3836 is 2.9 watts. Another big plus on the PM side, is the 3.4 deck height- not a huge amount of space to launch into, but a fantastic way of maximizing the IR raining down from the top burner(s).

I'm not fully endorsing the 451ED-1, but, at the same time, I'm not condemning it. On paper, this oven might have a chance.

In order for it to begin to be viable, though, you will need to confirm two features. First, that each of the three elements has separate temperature control.  If it's anything other than 3 separate controls, forget it.  Second, each element has to be the same- no major disparity in wattages between them.

Bear in mind, my thoughts about this oven are entirely in a 3+ minute NY style context.  This oven may go to 932, but I really don't think it has a chance to do Neapolitan bake times, nor do I think it can do the almost Neapolitan bakes that Jeff Varasano is doing now in his pizzeria. 932 is about 150 deg. too much for Neapolitan undercrust browning on cordierite, but I really don't see these 1.8 kW elements pumping out enough IR to do sub 3 minute top browning.

Mark, even if the 451 does look like it might work, if you have a typical 550 deg. electric oven, with the right hearth, you can avoid any risk, save yourself $4K and use your home oven for 3+ minute bakes- without putting the oven in jeopardy.

[barryvabeach]

Mark,  Scott knows a ton more about this topic than I ,  but I still think that a countertop oven has some advantages.  I have a prior version of the Bakers Pride P18S, though only the 110 volt model.  I also have a Viking dual fuel range, with electric oven, powered by 220 -  I think 25 amps -  while that is much more current than the BP, the BP has a much smaller oven, and a much higher temp. The upside of the countertop is that it can get much hotter than my stove -  650 is easily achievable, though that is hotter than I like the stone to be, and loading and unloading a pie is much easier.  The two main reasons are a short door - maybe 8 inches, compared to an oven  door that sticks out about 20 inches when open,  and a convenient height - with my oven, I have to bend over pretty far to load and unload pies.    The downside for the BP is that it does take forever to heat up , and while I haven't timed it, it takes a while to recover between pies. I replaced the stones with 1 inch corderiete, and allow a few hours to heat up, it probably heats up a little quicker than that, but not much.  I set it so the temp is 600 or so, then once I am ready, I turn the thermostat up, to try to get some top heat.  Tonight's NY style,  100 % wheat baked in about 4 minutes - with a nice brown on the bottom, and good color for the cheese, though if I set the temp a little higher to warm up, I have to use a screen for the last minute to keep from burning the bottom.  Since it has 2 stones, you can easily make 2 pies, but by the time you load the 3rd, the stone temp will have dropped a bunch.  Since I usually only make 2, it works fine for me.