A Re-Posting.

I know a lot of you probably will not read my first post...so I am posting it again for a little background.

About two (plus) years ago I became obsessed with pizza. My love affair with pizza actually started as a child. My mother made homemade pizza most Fridays along with pasta fagiole. My maternal grandmother made lots of pizza in her basement kitchen on Catalina Avenue in Youngstown Ohio. She was known for her pizza a variety of what is called "Briar Hill Pizza" in Youngstown. Briar Hill Pizza uses grated Romano cheese instead of mozzarella.

 I do not make that kind of pizza, I go for the thin kind and the recipe I use is a variation of my mom's which I have to say I get a lot of compliments. I love pizza so much, that now I want to make pizza as they do in Naples. So I am building a wood fire oven by hand. This has been a process. Each step from the slab up requires me to do a lot of reading and preparing but even with that, it is not as perfect as I would like it to be. I am a producer for a TV station, I shoot, write and edit my own work. It is a job I love and do well. But I do not know too much about building things, so I take my time and do each step in my head. Now the slab is down, the plinth is built and the oven floor is laid, and I am building the form out of sand and thought this might be a good time to share my experiences.  

OVEN DAY! January 1, 2013

I am late, I know... almost four months later and I am finally blogging about the awesome pizzas I made in my handmade clay oven--with the help of my pizza angels!  The day was cold but Bob and Jody where there to help me get the oven up to 800 degrees and ah, the pizzas we made!

I got a chainsaw for Christmas!
That's Jody!

The fire is getting hot---took a good hour!

 The pizza took about 90 seconds! We made four!

Bob got the fire going really well.

This the finished pizza from above.

Oh...my! The look on my friends' faces when they took their first bite will stay with me forever.  The best feeling in the world!

Briar Hill Pizza

I found this video on YouTube "Briar Hill Pizza" explaining "Briar Hill" pizza.  It is worth checking out, though the interview is a little long.  "Briar Hill" pizza is similar to the pizza my grandmother used to make, it's was created by the Italian immigrants that settled in Youngstown, Ohio in a section known as Briar Hill   This is where my mom's family grew up---a small hillside facing a working steel mill.   The pizza is still made today, and the local church, St. Anthony still sells the pizza on most Friday's mornings.