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There's nothing worse than mushy pickles! But don't worry, they just become like standard pickles but in a couple of minutes instead of days - you can dial in the degree of "doneness" quite easily by changing the vacuum strength and number of cycles you pull.

I’ve been lusting after a pizza party Ardore for a while now. From what I’ve read on pizza making forum most people seem to prefer gas where it’s an option - it tastes exactly the same as a well made wood fire but is quicker and easier by a big margin. I guess a lot would come down to how many you were cooking for too - if I was looking at doing four or five pies at a time the convenience of gas would be a big draw.

If the big joe is in budget, go for that. I guarantee - You’ll never think “I wish I’d got a smaller one”.

Looks lovely - Do you have any pics of the crumb/underside?

Pork belly burnt ends are great - try something like this recipe: https://www.hardcorecarnivore.com/blogs/hardcore-carnivore-recipes/pork-belly-bacon-burnt-ends you’ll want to take off the skin first - maybe make some crackling to go with your meal? 2-3 hours at around 250F to render soften and dry out, then scrape any fat from the back and finally crisp in a very hot oven or grill (about 450-500F) until puffed up and crunchy.

Oops - Sorry - don’t let me put you off too much! There are a few other options if you want to get close to Neapolitan without the expense. It might not be 100% but you could definitely make something very tasty. My favoured method at the moment (until I finally spring for an ardore oven) is to use my broiler on my oven. This combined with either a pizza steel or a good iron pan on my rangetop does a great job of pizza. Not sure what the DoJoe is priced at where you are but here it would be about £350 for my big joe - I can get one of the ovens mentioned above for that sort of money. So if you were thinking of one of those it may be worth looking elsewhere?

The issue with using a a Kamado and a pizza stone is that it's very hard to balance the heat to the base (from the stone) with the heat to the topping (from the dome). The only way to do this really is to dial back on the heat a bit. Now, there's nothing at all wrong with this - you can make some fantastic pizzas that way - but you won't be able to do the sort of ultra-short bake times you can get with a wood fired oven or something like the Blackstone pizza oven. It really comes down to what sort of pizza you're after - a thin Neapolitan style with leoparding and a cook time of 60-90 seconds just won't be doable, but a thicker style pie or a pan pizza would be totally within your Kamado's capabilities. I don't own a DoJoe but the idea of them is to overcome some of the dome heat loss caused by opening and closing the lid which I believe they do a good job of. However, they are limited to around 700F which for me isn't enough to move properly into the Neapolitan zone of 900F or so. If that's the type of pizza you are after then you need to be looking at a dedicated oven (Ooni, Pizza party Ardore, Roccbox, etc).

Matches the Joe

That looks delicious - it’s great to finally get using something you’ve had for a while isn’t it? I did that with a joule sous vide last year - must have had it about six months before I was able to get it up and running. Whats next on the menu...??

Mine is almost identical to @ebterrier‘s. Only change is that I don’t use garlic and I like to add a good helping of lime zest and juice. I sometimes leave the blackened skin in if I’m after a smokier taste.

Proper Neapolitan pizza (by definition) has to be cooked in a 900F oven in 60-90 seconds. But that’s a bit by the by... The sort of pizza that cooks well at 450 would be ruined in a 900 oven, just as much as a proper Neapolitan one won’t come out right in a domestic oven.

I don’t think many people would agree that a Neapolitan pizza cooked at 900 and a shop bought pizza cooked at 450 get “the same results”! you're totally right that 450 with shop bought pizza is easier... not really sure what the Kamado brings though? It would be even easier to just do this in an oven with a pizza stone wouldn’t it?

@John Setzler have you tried doing these in your chamber vacuum sealer? You can short cut the first few days of them sitting in the vinegar by just pulling a good vacuum on them and releasing two or three times.

Wow that looks amazing, I’ve got to try that! what sort of temp was your Weber running at during the cook? Did you add any wood for extra smoke?

How frustrating. Any pictures from your cook?