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My mum had a set of the Raymond blanc pans. Truly awful. I was never a fan of the design but on top of that they barely lasted a couple of years. baffles me how chefs who have made a career out of minute attention to detail could put their name to tat like this. Pays the tax bill I guess…

I’ve done pitta and naan a few times. They generally turn out well. Kerry’s right about the heat coming mainly from the back, however, with pitta the amount they puff can put them a bit near the ceiling of the oven. If they touch that they scorch pretty badly. Best technique I’ve found is being ready with the peel and just shielding them if they start to get a bit close. the other thing I’m still getting right is the thickness to roll out the dough to. There’s a pretty narrow window between being too thick and doughy and too thin they turn out like a crisp cracker. I’ve had a look but can’t seem to find any pictures, will post some up next time I try them

Are we just ignoring the fact the pizzas look terrible?

I’d definitely get the gas one - have used the pellet/wood oonis and after the novelty wears off you won’t use anything but gas. it’s so much easier and the taste is identical

Would shrimp be acceptable? brined shrimp, cooked on cedar planks and dressed with lemon and chive butter might be a nice bridge between boring plain food and something fun to make. They’re bloody tasty too.

Also cannot wait for this, looks a great product. chris, any thoughts about using it to control a fan blower for kamado Cooker?

@MikeMac this is great to hear. Glad it’s working out so well… I’m really getting sold on this idea. Hope you don’t mind me picking your brains some more: what have been your big wins? Like what food have you cooked that’s really improved on your previous normal ovens? anything you’d have done differently? Model choice, location, ventilation?

Just resurrecting this old topic. how have the last few years been with the Rational? I used one while on holiday in Italy a couple of years ago and was blown away. Would love to get one if/when we ever move house again.

@Kim Shook, the crackling on this pork was really good and I think that came down to the method. It was certainly a lot better than my usual attempts! as others have suggested, separating the skin from the meat is very helpful. In this case the sheet of skin was cooked SV at 70°C for 24 hours. After this time it was seriously soft with all of the collagen broken right down. Before starting there was very little fat on the underside which I think was helpful. I reapplied the skin to the cooked meat before crisping but I’m sure it could have been cooked separately too. Maybe dried the sheet in the fridge overnight before using the broiler or a very hot convection oven. edit: this is the skin before and after SV: mane reuinted with the rolled belly before tying and blasting at 230°C:

Reporting back on the pork belly. Wow! What a recipe. Really enjoyed this. One day I’ll definitely try the whole thing but for now I’m really happy with the parts I did. the belly is super moist, the skin sticks really well once it’s rolled back up and it cooked evenly and quickly. The tartness of the apple purée was perfect, and I loved the salad cream.

he’s brilliant isn’t he. For all the reasons you say, a very very impressive chef and person. shame about the books, I’ve only made a couple of things out of this one but I love it already. His steak and chips dish took me the best part of nine hours but was so worth it. Every element was as good as I’ve ever made - fillet of beef, triple cooked chips, onion rings, a spectacular bernaise, cafe de Paris butter and an absolutely belting red wine sauce. the “hog roast” is a multi element pig celebration. I’m only doing the belly part and some of the sides today but the whole contains: - rolled and Sv belly - braised head meat croquettes - stuffed trotter - a salt crust bag of baked potatoes - little gem salad with salad cream - apple puree - pork sauce I’ll post a pic from the book later edit: just had a look and it seems the book is available in the US in the new year... or even on kindle right now... https://www.amazon.com/Hand-Flowers-Cookbook-Tom-Kerridge/dp/147293539X/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=hand+and+flowers+cookbook&qid=1608796206&sprefix=hand+and+flowers&sr=8-1

Today I’m starting a version of Tom Kerridge’s “hog roast” from his new hand and flowers cookbook. belly of pork rolled and SV for 8 hours at 70°, the skin in a separate bag done for 24 hours. Once they’re both cooked and chilled I’ll put them back together again ready to roast tomorrow evening.

Looking great @Ann_T how do you find it?

You’re going to love it! I’ve it used mine for a few weeks (been on a lower carb diet to shed the extra weight I’ve gained during lockdown!). Can’t wait to get it out again.

I have that exact same oxo one and it’s the best I’ve used. For me, the non-negotiable add on was a pair of Kevlar cutproof gloves. They cost all of £7 on amazon but have saved my hands more times than I can remember. https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B07FDQJVF2/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_FvMhFbR1FW434

Wow! Thanks for taking the time for such a detailed answer again 🙂👍 for logistical reasons I’ll have to go overnight this weekend but I’ll definitely look to do some shorter ones when time allows. the dough in the glass was simply pulled from the main dough straight after mixing. I guess this will have slowed it down some given it was such a low volume for all of its rise? I’ll do as you suggest and go for as short as possible overnight in bulk then ball up first thing in the morning. I could do the dough around 9-10pm then ball it around 8am with an aim to cook around 1-2pm. That would be 16 hours In total so maybe I should just go for the same yeast amount as last time and see where it gets me? Depending on how that goes I’ll try the 0.2% yeast and a much shorter rise next time out. I am - although this is definitely a work in progress! I think I’m starting to get the hang of it though and it definitely seems to make a nice job than other techniques I’ve tried. when I get this Neapolitan business a bit more sorted I’d like to have a go of NY style. I’ve seen some people get very nice looking results from a koda 16 with the gas control turned the wrong way to give more NY temperatures. That can wait for another day though!

A font of knowledge as always 🙂👍 yeast is saf laveur ADY from a 500g tub. It’s a few months old but is working well in other breads at the moment. the test ball had more than doubled overnight which I guess is a good thing? This pic was at just shy of 24 hours from first mixing. maybe I’ll try the exact same recipe again but with an overnight proof instead of 8-10 hours. I could mix the dough at 6pm then ball it up at say 10pm ready to cook at 1-2pm the following day...

For my latest round of experimenting I tried the VPN recipe that Scott posted upthread. 100% Red Caputo 61% water (30°C) 2.7% salt 0.05% active dried yeast This was intended for an eight hour rise but was probably closer to ten by the time I made the final (and best) pizza. They had 6 hours in bulk and then were balled for the remainder. @scott123, what’s the effect of different times in bulk vs. balled? Next time I’ll try upping the yeast slightly as the dough hadn’t risen much during its time today. I put a test ball in a cylinder when I made the dough to measure it better and it only grew around 20% in size: Still, we had to eat so I ploughed on. I was cooking these for 75 seconds with a floor temp of 480°C. My turning has got a little bit better so I managed a slightly more even bake. They were good, definitely more enjoyable than the caputo pizzeria flour ones from last week. And I feel like I’m getting better at judging the right amount of sauce to add. On the downside I would say they could have been a bit thinner in the base, I’m guessing with a bit more fermenting time or a bit more yeast I might have been able to stretch them better. Next time around I’ll keep everything else the same and just change that one thing to see what effect it has. still loving the ooni. It’s a great bit of kit to play around with.

This is a great book on the science behind a lot of bbq. It has recipes, but in the main is a great read on what’s actually going on when we cook meat over flames. Meathead Goldwyn For recipes and ideas I love this from British (heresy!) bbq restaurant, Pitt Cue Pitt Cue

They look great ovens Paul. For me, the simplicity and form factor of the koda 16 made it the preferred choice (plus it was £150+ cheaper!). But if someone wanted the versatility of being able to burn wood or charcoal as well the pro seems a good choice - sometimes a real fire is just more fun. I remain sceptical about the taste difference though, Rotuts. I’ve never eaten at Pepes (though funnily enough I was watching a video about their pizzas just yesterday), but I’ve seen plenty of evidence that the great taste of these high (650-750F a la pepes) and very-high (900+F as in the ooni or a Neapolitan wood oven) heat pizzas comes from temperature alone rather than fuel choice.

agreed, the ease of use of this unit was one of the big selling points for me - connect to gas bottle, turn the ignition and I’m cooking pizza in 20-30 minutes. I’m not even sure there’s that much smoke from a properly lit wood burning pizza oven... isn’t the temp way too hot for that?

Thanks, Scott, that is another amazingly helpful answer. Those links are great too. After following the thread you posted I read your thoughts on when the dough was ready to cook, I think this might have been part of my less than stellar results too. The emergency dough was super light and definitely felt ready to go, the 48 hour stuff only had about 2-3 hours out of the fridge and was a fair bit firmer feeling and less risen pre-shape. I’ll give your recipe a go next time and see where we get to. Thanks again for taking the time, it’s really helpful.

thanks Scott, that’s all really really helpful. My shaping technique is still a work in progress, probably a bit ham fisted right now so I’ll try going a bit more gently. the theory about the long ferment time breaking down the dough seems like it might be right though - despite being just 60% hydration compared to the 64% of the emergency dough, this one felt a lot wetter and stickier when I shaped it. For my next try I think I’ll go back to cuoco and a longer fermentation. Do you have a preferred method at the moment?

So it was a bit of a mixed bag yesterday, the pizzas looked quite good and the dough had a good flavour but I wasn’t really happy with the texture. I cooked six pies in total and, despite experimenting with different heat levels, they all had a bit of an underbaked gumminess to them. Overall they weren’t as good as the quick dough I did earlier in the week. I made too many changes to be 100% sure what impact each made - different flour, lower hydration (60% vs the 64% in the quick dough) and a 48 hour ferment.

🤣 I was very surprised, I’d been looking for one for a while and had become increasingly resigned to not having it this summer. Then an ad on my google search made me check a store again that I’d looked at many times before - they suddenly had just a single unit available. I can only think it was a cancelled order or something. This was about 1am - for once I’m happy about targeted ads and insomnia! that’s really good to know, I’d not seen about the reformulation, what changed with it? Be interesting to see how they turn out this afternoon, do you reckon they’ll be ok with blue?