Building a Wood-Fired Oven for Bread and Pizza: For Bread & Pizza

Rating:
Summary: Comprehensive history of wood fired ovens.
Review: Although the book is a bit wordy, it gives the reader comprehensive history, information and instructions on how to build a wood-fired oven. The author is English and tends to refer primarily on British ovens and on baking bread. I bought the book to build an Italian style pizza oven, however the book mentions pizza only a few times. The plans on how to build a wood-fired oven are helpful and I am glad that such a book exists.

Rating:
Summary: Comprehensive history of wood fired ovens.
Review: Although the book is a bit wordy, it gives the reader comprehensive history, information and instructions on how to build a wood-fired oven. The author is English and tends to refer primarily on British ovens and on baking bread. I bought the book to build an Italian style pizza oven, however the book mentions pizza only a few times. The plans on how to build a wood-fired oven are helpful and I am glad that such a book exists.

Rating:
Summary: a good supplement to The Bread Builders
Review: If you're interested in building a wood-fired oven for baking, this is a good supplement to Alan Scott's essential "The Bread Builders". Provides very interesting historical background, amusing anecdotes and a set of plans which are aimed a bit more squarely at the amateur builder than Alan's plans. I'm building an oven now using plans interpolated between the two. If you're going to tackle a project like this, get a good book on masonry techniques too, or better yet, a video. (Amazon, care to provide some suggestions?)

Rating:
Summary: Not so helpful
Review: If you're interested in building a wood-fired oven for baking, this is a good supplement to Alan Scott's essential "The Bread Builders". Provides very interesting historical background, amusing anecdotes and a set of plans which are aimed a bit more squarely at the amateur builder than Alan's plans. I'm building an oven now using plans interpolated between the two. If you're going to tackle a project like this, get a good book on masonry techniques too, or better yet, a video. (Amazon, care to provide some suggestions?)

Rating:
Summary: a good supplement to The Bread Builders
Review: If you're interested in building a wood-fired oven for baking, this is a good supplement to Alan Scott's essential "The Bread Builders". Provides very interesting historical background, amusing anecdotes and a set of plans which are aimed a bit more squarely at the amateur builder than Alan's plans. I'm building an oven now using plans interpolated between the two. If you're going to tackle a project like this, get a good book on masonry techniques too, or better yet, a video. (Amazon, care to provide some suggestions?)

Rating:
Summary: Not so helpful
Review: The book gives one set of plans without much discussion on how to modify them. I was hoping for more theory and explaination about size, height, chimney placement etc.

In British fashion, the author uses more words than necessary to explain himself (think Dickens).

Overall, not a complete waste of time, but less helpful than the title would lead you to believe.