How to light a wood fired pizza oven…

There is a technique to lighting a traditional wood fired pizza oven. The following pizza ovens all use this technique: Igneus, Clementi, Inferno, Delivita, Igneus Ceramiko and Gozney Dome.  Once you have mastered it will only take about 15-30+ minutes to get a small / medium oven up to heat. The heat up time will take longer than this if you have a large pizza oven.

Key things to note

• Do not use paper to light the fire. Use a natural firelighter instead.
• Use Kindling and Kiln Dried Silver Birch logs as fuel.
• Silver Birch logs need to be 10-12 inches long and 3 inches wide for all ovens apart from the Igneus Minimo. (We recommend 6 inches long and 1 inch wide for the Minimo)
• WARNING: Do not use any form of accelerants such as petrol, kerosene or paraffin as it is extremely dangerous.

If you are needing wood to use in your pizza oven, we have a wood bundle that includes everything you need. This includes: natural firelighters, kindling and kiln dried hardwood logs.

Lighting technique

1. Build a tower of kindling in the centre of your oven. Use a natural firelighter (such as Twizzlers) to get the fire going.
2. Light the natural firelighter with a match and leave the door off the oven and the chimney damper open (if the oven has a damper). The fire should begin to build up.
3. For 10 minutes keep adding kindling into the pizza oven at the rate of about 4 pieces every couple of minutes.
4. You should now begin to see a healthy red glow from the significant pile of embers, with a healthy yellow flame coming from the large kindling as it burns. The fire should be well established now.
5. When you have reached 450 – 500C, you will then move the fire to the back or side of your pizza oven. Do this by using the embers rake or brush. (The Clementi requires the fire to be on the left side of the oven)
6. Now add 2 or 3 silver birch logs into the fire (use the pizza peel to place them onto the fire). These should burn for about 25-30 minutes before the oven needs to be fed once again.

If you are struggling with the process or would just like some advice. Give us a call on 01423 608 648.

Below are some videos to show you the process…

For more helpful pizza oven videos, visit our YouTube Channel.