Author Topic: Finally Found "THE" Oven- Pacific Coast Brick (Read 7455 times)

anthony2173 · « **on:** May 08, 2007, 10:56:42 PM »

I have been looking at pizza ovens for some time and thought I had narrowed my search to a Forno Bravo model and then a friend told me about a company called Pacific Coast Brick Ovens that is local to the Sacramento area.

I called the company and spoke to the owner / builder and was told that they demo their ovens every Tuesday afternoon. I made my way to their facility today and was amazed.

The 36" model I looked at can be fired with natural gas, propane or wood. It sits on a steel platform that puts the cooking deck just under eye level (I'm 5' 11") and has casters that allow you to move the oven around. This is going to be great for those summer days when the sun beats down on the patio. If I don't like where I'm cooking I will just move the oven!

The oven was at 900 degrees when I arrived. The owner / builder, Charlie, put together a 14 inch pizza and proceeded to cook it within 90 seconds.

I thought I had things good with my gas Big Green Egg but when I saw the even char and cooking time that he was able to achieve from this oven I was sold. Not only was it amazing to watch the cooking process but the flavor of his pizza was fantastic.

What I found best of all was that Charlie is a pizza guy to the core. Charlie and I chatted for almost two hours about dough, toppings and past pizza experiments. It was great to see somebody with 30+ years of experience making pizza still have the enthusiasm that many of us share.

If you are in the market for an oven I would highly recommend that you give Pacific Coast Brick Ovens a call. They are at 916-858-8250

I shopped around for a long time and just can't wait to finally get the oven in my backyard!

grovemonkey · « **Reply #1 on:** May 08, 2007, 11:50:59 PM »

The homepage isn't very well done, let's hope they hire someone to put together a better page. The ovens looks small, I wonder how hot the sides of the ovens get? I am also curious about the weight. I like the fact that they seem so small but I wonder how that affects the overall performance, etc.

grove

anthony2173 · « **Reply #2 on:** May 09, 2007, 02:16:28 AM »

That’s funny; I said the same thing about their home page and was told that they are working on it.

I can' tell you what the oven weighs but it was fairly easy to wheel around. The size for the one I’m getting is 3 feet across and about the same deep. This will allow me to cook 1 or 2 pizza at a time. Given the fact that they cook so fast that's all I really need.

As for heat, the bottom is just a base that houses a 7 gallon propane tank and the gas fittings. The sides of the oven itself were cool enough to lay your hand on. The builder actually walked me through the manufacturing process and is using a considerable amount of refrax and thermal blankets prior to applying the stucco.

I think I'm actually as sold on the husband and wife who run the company as I am on their products. They are genuinely nice people and I'm hoping they do well.

EdF · « **Reply #3 on:** May 09, 2007, 07:02:31 PM »

I'me sure you'll keep us posted once you get it. What was the price?

anthony2173 · « **Reply #4 on:** May 10, 2007, 02:20:32 AM »

The price was just north of 4K for the 36" model.

grovemonkey · « **Reply #5 on:** May 10, 2007, 05:35:00 AM »

I'll be waiting for the pie photos.. if it gets up to around 900 + that's great.. you should be able to make some really interesting pies with that..

Bill/SFNM · « **Reply #6 on:** May 10, 2007, 07:22:56 AM »

Quote from: anthony2173 on May 08, 2007, 10:56:42 PM

The oven was at 900 degrees when I arrived.

Where was that temp measured? Floor? Air? Dome?

Thanks.

Bill/SFNM

anthony2173 · « **Reply #7 on:** May 11, 2007, 02:22:38 AM »

This was the floor temp but I will measure dome and air temps soon.

I would like to add that I was so impressed with the owners and their product that as of today I volunteered my time and energies to try and help them sell ovens.

The builder and his wife are true pizza aficionados. Hopefully I can add some value to their business and gain a little knowledge about the design and manufacture of these ovens along the way.

anthony2173 · « **Reply #8 on:** May 12, 2007, 01:43:54 PM »

Just a heads up, I have been given approval to offer a 10% discount to pizzamaking.com members on complete ovens and oven kits.

anthony2173 · « **Reply #9 on:** June 01, 2007, 11:45:44 PM »

After some deliberation I decided to opt out of the 36" oven and go for the big 4 footer. These ovens are sold in kit form, assembled with a scratch coat ready for placement or assembled on a stand. I elected for the stand with gas and thermostat control...

Typically these are assembled at Pacific Coast Brick Ovens and delivered all pretty and ready to fire but I asked that we build it at my House so that I can watch the process and get my hands a little dirty.

Here's what it looks like prior to being finished. It should be complete and ready to fire this weekend!

anthony2173 · « **Reply #10 on:** June 03, 2007, 07:33:14 PM »

We finished the oven on Saturday. All that is left is the acid wash, granite and some cleaning... of course that didn't keep me from cooking in it Saturday night!

Flagpull · « **Reply #11 on:** June 03, 2007, 09:28:09 PM »

I'd say that the moment you "volunteered" to sell their ovens, this post officially became spam.

http://www.pizzamarketplace.com/classifieds/showcat.php?cat=500&ppuser=6207

anthony2173 · « **Reply #12 on:** June 04, 2007, 10:06:04 PM »

I see your point but I do volunteer my time. The people who own the company are great, love what they do and are in it for the same reason all of us are... they simply love everything about making pizza. I hope if I ever decide to take a leap of faith and try to make pizza my livelihood there will be some people as enthusiastic as myself who are there to lend a hand.

grovemonkey · « **Reply #13 on:** June 07, 2007, 04:39:29 AM »

It is spam but I think it will be interesting if you can cook up some good pizza's in it and post the results on the forum. that's all that really matters to me. Plus, how much did you kick down for that oven..

grovemonkey

anthony2173 · « **Reply #14 on:** July 14, 2007, 02:30:47 AM »

I have $7,500.00 into the oven. I have great pictures of the building, pictures from a flir thermal cam and some great pizza shots but can't for the life of me scale the picture sizes down enough to get them to post. It's a little embarrassing, I manage software development projects for a living and I can't resize a simple picture at home.

It took me the better part of 30 minutes to scale back this lil' thumbnail below.

anthony2173 · « **Reply #15 on:** July 14, 2007, 02:38:10 AM »

I think I may have figured this out... on second thought I can only get these two images reduced to the correct size.

Barry · « **Reply #16 on:** July 14, 2007, 06:02:08 AM »

Hi Anthony,

I noticed from one of the earlier pics that you posted that the gas burner was being used to heat the oven.

I have a "pre cast oven" made by Pappaz Ovenz in South Africa, and it is also a wood/LPgas burning oven. I have found that the gas burner gets the oven to very high temps (950 deg F) within about 20 minutes, and I can then cook a pizza in under 60 seconds. I start the heating process with wood, and then "boost" the heat with gas, and cook with both heat sources burning.

Have you found the same ?

Kind regards.

Barry

anthony2173 · « **Reply #17 on:** July 14, 2007, 01:49:08 PM »

Although the oven is capable of using both wood and gas I have not tried wood as of yet. I'm looking forward to using wood to see what kind of flavor it imparts on the pizza but have young twins and haven't had the time or energy to experiment that much. The oven heats within about 20-30 minutes and cooks a fairly thick crust pizza (by NY style standards) in 90-120 seconds.

Cooking at this temperature really is a vast departure from using the convection oven in my house. Within seconds of sliding the pie in the oven you begin hearing the toppings sizzle and the dough begins to "blow". I found that toppings like pepperoni which I never used before have become favorites. The heat causes the pepperoni to cup and singe slightly around the edges. I have definitely had to vary my old cooking style but the results have been well worth it.

Villa Roma · « **Reply #18 on:** July 15, 2007, 08:44:13 AM »

Quote from: anthony2173 on July 14, 2007, 02:30:47 AM

I have $7,500.00 into the oven. I have great pictures of the building, pictures from a flir thermal cam and some great pizza shots but can't for the life of me scale the picture sizes down enough to get them to post. It's a little embarrassing, I manage software development projects for a living and I can't resize a simple picture at home.

It took me the better part of 30 minutes to scale back this lil' thumbnail below.

anthony2173,

Here's how I scale my images. Just open your picture in MS paint, click on the image menu and then choose stretch/skew. You can then enter a scale factor for horizontal and vertical size. It's usually best to make them the same. Paint does a great job and you'll find that you can have a relatively large physical size image with small file size.

Villa Roma

anthony2173 · « **Reply #19 on:** July 21, 2007, 02:06:47 AM »

Thanks Villa Roma, I plan on making some pizza over the weekend and will post some shots. If there is anybody in the Folsom Ca area who wants to give the oven a whirl and see how their pizza dough turns out at a high heat you are welcome to swing by.