Product Description

Build Your Own Earth Oven is a fully-illustrated handbook for making a simple, wood-fired, masonry-style oven. It provides clear, step-by-step instructions for building and firing the oven, as well as complete directions for making sourdough bread in the best (and simplest) artisan tradition.

Earth ovens are as simple as a southwestern horno or European bee-hive oven and every bit as effective as a fancy brick hearth or modern, steam-injected commercial oven. The dense, three-to-twelve inch thick earthen walls store the heat of the fire; after the hot coals are removed, the hot walls radiate a steady, intense heat for hours. The resulting steamy environment is essential for the crisp, flavorful crusts of true hearth loaves, and you can easily build it for less than the price of a couple of fancy dough-rising baskets!

If you like to cook outdoors, an earth oven can also transform fresh fruits, vegetables and herbs into delicious pies, pizzas, and other creations (one of my favorites is fresh vegetables, herbs, and potatoes drizzled with olive oil). Pizza cooks to perfection in three minutes, and you can even use the residual heat to dry your surplus garden produce, and incubate your home-made yogurt!

Building with earth is safe, easy, inexpensive, and extraordinarily effective. Good building soil is usually right under your feet! Many will find it in their back yards. Use it plain, or mixed with sand and straw. Build the simplest oven in a day! Adding a roof and foundation makes it permanent. The simple, round shape makes a beautiful garden sculpture, or can be sculpted into a fire-breathing dragon!

It is a project that appeals to bakers, builders, and beginners of all kinds:

The serious or aspiring baker who wants the best lo-cost oven for their bread;

Gardeners and outdoor cooks who want a centerpiece for a beautiful outdoor kitchen;

People interested in creative uses of low-cost materials and simple technologies; and

Teachers who want a multi-faceted, experiential learning experience for their students (the book has been successful with everyone from third-graders to adults).

Illustrated by the author with over a hundred drawings and photos, it includes color pictures of sculpted ovens and their builders, as well as further references on food, baking, and building.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #607203 in Books
• Published on: 2000-05-15
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 132 pages

From Library Journal
Denzer, an artist and builder, creates beautiful wood-fired ovens using the most widely available building material: dirt. Some earth ovens are plain while others are formed into the shape of animals or human faces. Denzer offers an explanation of basic concepts such as material selection, oven location, and design and then guides readers through the construction of their own oven. Earth ovens could be produced most anywhere using Denzer's instructions; he even shows how to build a weatherproof roof. A sourdough bread recipe is included. Appealing to a diverse audience of bakers, outdoor cooks, traditional crafts persons, and perhaps even homeschoolers looking for a project, this title should be part of most public library collections.
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review
...enjoyable, down-to-earth and sensible....his instructions are clear as rainwater, his advice...intelligent and sound.... -- Petit Propos Culinaires, #70, August 2002

...inspired creativity combined with traditional wisdom....Get a copy and build yourself an earth bread oven. It's that simple. -- www.walnutbooks.com, April 2003

Brief, brisk, artful, and well-written....explains the principles of breadmaking with a few deft strokes.... Graceful, well-detailed, and empowering throughout. -- Permaculture Activist, August, 2004

Creative. Innovative. Brilliant. This is the definitive book on how to build an adobe oven. ...clear and precise instructions... -- www.williamrubel.com

Review
"... the essential book…worth many times its price in avoided labor and frustration" — Dan Wing, author, The Bread Builders: Hearth Loaves & Masonry Ovens.

"[It] will awaken in you...the artisan vision, where earth meets hand meets spirit" — Peter Reinhart, author, Crust and Crumb

"Creative. Innovative. Brilliant. ...the definitive book on how to build an adobe oven..." — William Rubel, author, The Magic of Fire

"...simplicity itself: brief, brisk, artful, and well-written....empowering throughout...fruit of a new movement for sustainability, it celebrates the pleasure of living well with the earth"— Peter Bane, Permaculture Activist.

Customer Reviews

Summer Camp Hit
I ran a summer family camp in July 2002 and built the smaller oven in one day. I had kids from age two to fifty two stomping the clay, sand, hay and water with thier feet. I set fire in the oven on day two and made our first loaf of bread. The directions are easy to follow and was a hit with my fourty campers. I would highly recommend this book. A great family or group activity! Loved it.

Bread, Beauty, and Integrity
Reading Kiko Denzer's book for the second time this December, as I thought about friends who would most enjoy a copy as a present, I was struck again by the artistic beauty and integrity of the book as a whole. Unlike most manuals, Denzer talks about life, not just bread, or ovens, or art.

The sculptural ovens delight the eye; the color photos and flowing drawings inspire. The instructions are clear and suffused with a philosophy of simple, harmonious living. Quotes add an unexpected depth. Finally, the explanation of bread-making science and technique makes a full circle of the various experiences of making, eating, and living.

The design and excellent presentation has drawn positive comments from friends, anthropologists, ecologists, as well as visitors and professional community workers from Mali, Tunisia, Japan, England, Ireland. Another friend, after seeing the book, went home with plans to build an oven for the intentional community where she lives.

As a Peace Corps Volunteer, I helped people build improved cook stoves (out of earth) in West Africa. Now, as an anthropologist, professor, trainer, and returned Volunteer I especially appreciate instructional texts that respect traditions of living within material limits. I would highly recommend this book, not only to home bakers and builders, but particularly to teachers and others who work in community settings.

amazing!
I read the book, and immediately wanted to build an oven.

Wonderfully written and easy to follow. It was so easy in fact that i was able to build my oven, with the help of my 10 year old son over the summer. Man hours totatled about 30. I will now build a friends oven as a surprsie next weekend! IT is that easy!

Read this book and you too will realize that you can indeed built your own oven, easily, cheaply and with fun for all involved.

*Build your own Earth Oven* is simply AMAZING!