Thanks, Cliff. Do you put the chunks of oak right on top of the lit charcoal, so that they catch fire, or do you have the tombstone shaped stone and the grate that lets you hang a CharBasket at pizza level, like I have? I've thought about using hardwood down at the charcoal grate level, too, but only used wood in the CharBasket on this first attempt.
Chris, great photos! I don't have a Kettle Pizza setup, but I do have the Camp Chef Italia Pizza Oven that sits on top of a Camp Chef 2 burner Stove. (Xmas gift) Mine also has has a thermometer on top of the dome, but my instructions say to use a inferred thermometer gun so you can keep an eye on the temp of the pizza stone with it, and use the built in thermometer on dome to see the ambient air temp.
The first pizza I did, was nothing shy of Pizza Parlor perfect! Took 2 minutes, rotated once with pizza spinners, and stone temp was 800 degrees. The second pizza was nothing shy of a disaster, as I got a bit cocky from the excellent outcome of the first, and forgot to assemble the pizza on the semolina dusted peel. When I caught my mistake, I was able to drag the pizza on the peel, but the semolina dragged as well, and when I tried to put pizza in the oven, the pizza rolled under itself, and created the biggest hot mess, I've ever seen, or cleaned! But the dog loved the toppings!
Anyway, if you don't already have a IR thermometer gun, to accompany your pizza kettle, I'd get one. With a laser beam. I think I got mine on Amazon on one of their kindle lightning deals for $20. or so. That way, you know exactly what your stones temp is.
Excellent pies!
Some beautiful photos Chris, that last pic is amazing
Great looking pies, Chris. Looks like you've got it figured out.
Hey Matt, congrats on the KP purchase. I have a pizza stone that did not come with the KP and its about 3/4 inch thick so I heat it up for a good 20 minutes or so. These things burn a lot of fuel so you will have to find a good balance of preheat time and cook time. The KP also takes some getting used too. so please dont get discouraged if your first pies dont look perfect. Just keep at it and you will soon find a routine that will work for you every time. Make sure you post some pictures of cooks. we need a few more KP threads on here.
I put down about 3/4's of a chimney of unlit kbb and then add a full chimney of lit kbb then toss in 2 or 3 small splits of wood then put the KP and stone and steel on top. i let it heat up for 15 or 20 minutes then start cooking. When temps begin to fall I'll throw in another split or two, no more KBB and wait for the fire to stop smoking and come back up to temp then cook the rest of the pizzas.