The Pizza Therapy Forum and Pasta Therapy Forum

[pizza]

Iw as fortunate enough to get James of fornobravo.com to take out a few minutes out of his work day for an interview. James shared how he got his start making pizza: using a pizza stone.

Albert: Hi James you are the owner of fornobravo.com . Can you tell me
a little bit about your company and products?

James: Hi Albert. Thanks for having me on Pizza News. I love your
site -- which is how we met. Forno Bravo specializes in wood-fired pizza ovens, brick oven accessories and pizza ingredients. We have a range of pizza oven types and sizes for the home owner, including pizza oven kits, real brick ovens, and fully assembled ovens.
Typically, residential pizza ovens are between 31" and 43" -- large enough to cook multiple pizza at a time, but still easy to manage and fast to heat up. Our ovens, tools and pizza ingredients are all made in Italy -- and they let the American pizza chef make world-class pizza at home.

Albert: How did you get interested in wood fired ovens?

James: I got into wood-fired ovens the same way most Pizza News readers
got interested in making pizza -- I started with a pizza stone. After doing that for a while, I was ready for the next step. There were plans you could buy for building a brick bread oven, so I got a set and built the oven. It was great learning experience. The oven design
is wrong, but it was great having a real wood-fired oven. I went ahead and put one in our kitchen/great room, and I was hooked. Cooking in a wood-fired oven is one of life's real pleasures.

Our ovens are designed to cook at about 750F -- making the perfect 2-3 minute pizza.

Albert: I understand you had some training and visits to Italy can
you tell me about that? Is it true that for Italians, having a wood fired oven is as common as the American Bar-be-cue?

James: As a cooking enthusiast, one of the first things you notice when you
are in Italy is that there are brick ovens everywhere -- particularly in Tuscany. We lived in Florence for two years while we were starting up Forno Bravo.

For example, daughters were invited to birthday parties through their school -- and 4 of the first 5 houses we visited has brick ovens. Both of our neighbors had ovens, and when I was installing an oven at our rental house, the garden came up and introduced himself, and proceeded to tell me about his oven, and how I should install my oven. The firewood company we used had a regular delivery schedule for 30 wood-fired restaurants just in the neighborhood south of the Arno.

There are a number of options for learning to make great pizza. I took lessons from a handful of schools and teachers in and around Florence. But the real home for pizza is Naples, where there are 1500 wood-fired pizzerias in the city itself. You can take lessons
and become a professional pizzaiolo -- but it takes time. A number of Forno Bravo owners have taken the one-week class, and they all say that a week just isn't long enough.
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