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**Steveack** · July 30, 2021, 08:23 PM

The oven was an idea I had after taking a pizza making class in NYC about 7 years ago. I researched wood fired oven design as much as I could stand and discovered they are like the multitude of theories on smoking, everyone has an opinion, no one is wrong and few can ever agree. So I came up with a idea for a prototype, laid it out, built it and much to my surprise it works. The smoker was inspired by two things. The first being my cheap metal vertical that I loved but went up in flames one Sunday morning and a brick smoker outside a 17th century farm house my brother in law has been restoring. I thought that I could use some leftover fire brick to build the smoker and duplicate the heat source from my burned out vertical smoker. Dammed if I wasn’t right, don’t tell my wife, the thing works like a charm. A propane burner supplies the heat to a old cast iron pot I picked up at an estate sale. The wood smokes in the pot and moves up through the chamber and a small chimney at the top acts as a vent. A wad of aluminum foil works to damper and control airflow along with temperature as does a dual control for the burner. Most of the fumes from the combustion are vented through a second chimney I incorporated behind the smoke chamber. It is very simplistic in its design but more effective than I could imagine. The doors are cedar and add a little character to the process. Most surprising to me is the amount of moisture the fire brick absorb when left alone and release when heated, makes for a most delicious experiment.