Month: May 2021

Earlier today, I finally had the opportunity to unbox my Ooni Pro and bake a pizza!

I received it last Saturday; however, since it was raining outside, I did not want my first time with my pizza oven done in the rain, and although I was disappointed, I decided to hold off baking in my Ooni Pro until this weekend. I was praying that we’d have appropriate outdoor pizza oven baking weather, and we did!

I must say that the pizza oven was well packed. There was an exterior box that had the company logo, and upon opening that,

it was in another box with a lovely photo of the oven on one side and delicious pictures of pizza (on the other side) gracing the box.

 

 

The pizza dough was made last Sunday when I made a pizza in the conventional oven. The leftover dough was rolled into a pizza dough ball, wrapped, and had been resting in the refrigerator since that time. This morning, I pulled out the dough to be at room temperature by the time I made the pizza. Although it’s a multi-fuel oven, I’ll mainly use wood in my 16″ Ooni Pro. We have a wood-burning stove used when the weather is cool, so there was plenty of wood on hand.

It took about thirty minutes to heat the oven to the appropriate temperature. Although they recommend using a digital thermometer to check the temperature within the oven, I just looked at the thermometer on the exterior door of the Ooni Pro. I placed my hastily prepared pizza within the oven.

How long did it take for the pizza to cook? About 90 seconds. After about 30 seconds, I used my pizza peel to slightly pull it out of the oven, turn a few degrees clockwise, and place it back into the oven. I did this two more times (perhaps 15 seconds apart) and finished it.

I did have to chuckle at the pizza shape. It looks like a bicycle seat. But how did it taste? Amazing. My daughter loved it, and so did I.

I made this pizza fast. I tossed the ingredients on in the pizza in about three minutes. The ingredients were simple but flavorful. I’ve made fantastic pizza in our conventional oven; however, I must say that this is the best pizza I’ve made thus far, and that has everything to do with how quickly the oven cooks the pizza. Perhaps it being wood-fired has something to do with it also?

I do plan on using my outdoor wood-fired oven tomorrow if it doesn’t rain.

Short video of my Ooni Pro. In the video Regina, the cat makes a cameo.

I made a homemade pizza today. My daughter said it was excellent; however, I didn’t use my Ooni pizza outdoor oven. As mentioned, yesterday I finally received my Ooni Pro. It rained yesterday, and we received rain throughout the day today. Since I did not want my first experience with my outdoor pizza oven to be spent getting rained upon while I tested out the oven, I decided to postpone using the outdoor pizza oven a bit longer.  I’m hoping next weekend the weather will be much better.

I just used our regular oven to make the pizza. I used my baking steel for the crisp crust that my daughter and I love.

And since the pizza peel that I’d specifically ordered arrived this morning, I used that when sliding the pizza into the oven. You might see part of the handle in the above picture. I must say that the pizza dough wasn’t as flavorful since I made and used the dough the same day. I typically wait a few days before making the pizza since the dough is much more flavorful.

 

Yesterday I made my daughter homemade chocolate chip cookies.

I made enough to make four dozen. However, I only baked one dozen last evening.

The rest of the cookie dough will be baked at a later time. Chilling the cookie dough allows it to become more hydrated, and the flavor is enhanced. As the flour breaks down into sugar, the dough becomes sweeter. As with the pizza dough, I used my Ankarsrum 6230 stand mixer. I love that mixer. I’ve had it for a little over a year, and it’s worth the amount of money ($699) that I paid. It blasts through anything I place into it without any issues. It should outlast me. Thus far, the most I’ve mixed in this mixer was about 12 cups of bread dough.

Tomorrow, after work, I’m hoping to make sushi. I’ll make a vegan and meat version. Last evening I purchased a Sushi Bazooka maker from Amazon. It arrived this morning. The device should make rolling the sushi even easier than using the bamboo mat.

 

The above video is what made me decide to make the purchase.