Baby, Light My Fire (With an Outdoor Pizza Oven)

Last night Ashwin and I had the pleasure of attending a casual dinner party at a colleague's beautiful, older home in a cozy neighborhood on the bay in Alameda. It had been raining most of the morning and afternoon but the skies cleared just in time for the soiree. Homemade pizza was on the menu so I brought a bottle of 2010 Chalone Pinot Noir (Monterey, $18.99 at Bevmo), as red wine and pizza always go well together.

The atmosphere was warm and inviting and we were in love with the beautiful kitchen she had; however, we were more in awe of the grand outdoor pizza oven that was the center piece of their backyard. The wood fire was already going in the oven and the dough was being made for the made to order wood-fired pizzas that would be coming later. We learned that the oven can get up to 900 degrees Fahrenheit and can cook more than just a superb pizza. Glancing through a cookbook that was produced by the same maker of the ovens, I saw stunning pictures of full Thanksgiving dinners made in the outdoor wood-fire oven. Ashwin and I are now predicting an outdoor wood fire pizza oven in our home-owning future.

A different model of the wood-fire pizza oven from the same importer

The stunning oven is imported from Italy by Mugnaini Imports, located in Watsonville, CA. The company sells various different sizes and specs of indoor and outdoor wood-fire ovens. They also offer classes at different locations on wood fire cooking techniques and how to perfect the art of wood-fired pizza.

Back to the pizza. It was crisp, golden, delectable, and done in no more than 3 minutes! We had various pizzas with a multitude of toppings, the next one outdoing the previous one. Peppers, prosciutto, tomato, zucchini, olives, mushroom, pepperoni, etc. We also tried our hand at Indian-style pizzas, with homemade naan baked in the oven and topped with goat cheese and cilantro. With the remaining dough, our hostess made wood-fired oven baked foccacia bread. Can you imagine anything tastier than that?