Wood-fired ovens, also known as wood ovens (or Forno a legna in Italian

Italian language

Italian is a Romance language spoken mainly in Europe: Italy, Switzerland, San Marino, Vatican City, by minorities in Malta, Monaco, Croatia, Slovenia, France, Libya, Eritrea, and Somalia, and by immigrant communities in the Americas and Australia...

), are oven

Oven

An oven is a thermally insulated chamber used for the heating, baking or drying of a substance. It is most commonly used for cooking. Kilns, and furnaces are special-purpose ovens...

s that use wood fuel

Wood fuel

Wood fuel is wood used as fuel. The burning of wood is currently the largest use of energy derived from a solid fuel biomass. Wood fuel can be used for cooking and heating, and occasionally for fueling steam engines and steam turbines that generate electricity. Wood fuel may be available as...

 for cooking

Cooking

Cooking is the process of preparing food by use of heat. Cooking techniques and ingredients vary widely across the world, reflecting unique environmental, economic, and cultural traditions. Cooks themselves also vary widely in skill and training...

. There are two types of wood-fired ovens: "black ovens" and "white ovens". Black ovens are heated by burning wood in a chamber and the food is cooked in that same chamber alongside the fire while it is still going, or in the heated chamber after the fire and coals have been swept out. White ovens are heated by heat transfer from a separate combustion chamber and flue-gas path, and thus the oven remains "white", or clean from ash. While the traditional wood-fired oven is a masonry oven

Masonry oven

A masonry oven, colloquially known as a brick oven or stone oven, is an oven consisting of a baking chamber made of fireproof brick, concrete, stone, or clay. Though traditionally wood-fired, coal-fired ovens were common in the 19th century, modern masonry ovens are often fired with natural gas or...

, such ovens can also be built out of adobe

Adobe

Adobe is a natural building material made from sand, clay, water, and some kind of fibrous or organic material , which the builders shape into bricks using frames and dry in the sun. Adobe buildings are similar to cob and mudbrick buildings. Adobe structures are extremely durable, and account for...

, cob, or even cast iron

Cast iron

Cast iron is derived from pig iron, and while it usually refers to gray iron, it also identifies a large group of ferrous alloys which solidify with a eutectic. The color of a fractured surface can be used to identify an alloy. White cast iron is named after its white surface when fractured, due...

.

Wood-fired ovens are distinct from wood cookstoves which have a hot cooking surface for pots and pans, like on a gas or electric stove. A wood cookstove may also have an oven but it is separate from the fire chamber. Regardless of material they all have an oven chamber consisting of a floor (or hearth), a dome, and an entry (oven opening).
Unlike modern household gas or electric ovens which provide a nearly constant cooking temperature, a black oven oven is typically heated only once during the firing stage (the combustion of wood inside the oven chamber). After the coals are raked out, the oven gradually cools over a period of hours or even days (in the case of a well-insulated oven). Immediately after a firing, the oven temperature may easily exceed 1000 degrees Fahrenheit. The mass of the oven acts as a 'thermal battery', which slowly releases heat over time. The retained heat in the oven may be used to cook multiple batches of bread, or alternatively, foods requiring different temperatures can be cooked in succession as the temperature of the oven slowly drops. This practice maximizes the efficiency of the oven, by fully utilizing the thermal energy stored during the firing process.

See also

• Masonry oven
  Masonry oven
  A masonry oven, colloquially known as a brick oven or stone oven, is an oven consisting of a baking chamber made of fireproof brick, concrete, stone, or clay. Though traditionally wood-fired, coal-fired ovens were common in the 19th century, modern masonry ovens are often fired with natural gas or...
  
  
• Stove
  Stove
  A stove is an enclosed heated space. The term is commonly taken to mean an enclosed space in which fuel is burned to provide heating, either to heat the space in which the stove is situated or to heat the stove itself, and items placed on it...
  
  
• Chimenea
  Chimenea
  A chimenea is a freestanding front-loading fireplace or oven with a bulbous body and usually a vertical smoke vent or chimney.-History:Originally, all clay open fire garden heaters imported to the U.S. from Mexico were known as chimeneas...
  
  
• Wood economy
  Wood economy
  The existence of a wood economy, or more correctly, a forest economy , is a prominent matter in many developing countries as well as in many other nations with temperate climate and especially in those with low temperatures. These are generally the countries with greater forested areas...
  
  
• Electric fireplace
  Electric fireplace
  An electric fireplace is an electric heater that mimics a fireplace burning coal, wood, or natural gas. Electric fireplaces are often placed in conventional fireplaces, which can then no longer be used for conventional fires...