I pulled the trigger last week and decided to get a double stack if Edge pizza ovens.
I originally wanted the 1830’s bc of space issues but Nick at Alpha restaurant equipment, talked sense into me, and I got a double stack 3240’s
I spent yesterday along with my bro and manager moving all my fryers, make table, cut table, charbroiler, flat grill out of the way to make a path for the new ovens. It was alot of work, mostly cleaning.
This morning at 6:00am the crew arrived. Within 20 mins they had the two blodgett 1048’s out of my store. What a mess back there.
They wheeled in the new ovens and had them assembled in no time. They reconfigured the fingers and test baked a pizza, it wasnt a real test though bc I ran out of my pizza cheese over the weekend and had to use a different brand. I said the pizza configuration was good 475F 6:00 mins-closed,1/4,closed, 1/2.
I think I want to change the last finger to a 1/3 or a 1/4 bc I think its browning the cheese a bit too much. Also 5:45 mins works just great.
I know the conveyor is going to make things easier but IM NERVOUS bc I dont have a good work flow down, I feel like the pizza making process is slower the screens are hard to grab they all stick to eachother. Do you guys get skins ready before dinner? Toasting subs worries me too. I didnt open today bc the store had to be reassembled, rearranged,releveled,recleaned. I convinced myself me and the crew deserved the night off after the 2 months of getting our butts kicked everyday and night. It was a cop out definitely bc deep down im worried bc everything is different. Can anyone give me clarity on how to run the pizza station? Do you have a person stretching and boxing, then another topping, at what point do you think a 2 person team is warranted on pizzas? then adding subs toasting in there too. I need this to help us badly I cant keep telling customers an hour for pizza pick up on Friday nights and still not have their pizza in the oven bc we are so slammed
You’ll be fine. If anything you’ll speed up your times with the new ovens. A two person team is warranted when one person can no longer handle it and starts to fall behind. If you’re at 1 hour pick up times then I would add another person to help watch the oven and box pizzas and the other person to stretch and top the pizzas. Every time that one person has to leave the table to check the oven or box and cut a pizza slows down your production. If they are allowed to just focus on what needs to be made they will be more organized and efficient. Adding someone to watch the oven and box/cut pizzas will allow for this and will shorten your output time. For the subs get a few timers with magnets on the back and stick them to the ovens or the hood, set the timer to go off when you think the subs should get pulled out.
After a few days Ive calmed down some, we did $6000 tonight and it was pretty easy. The toasting of the subs is still kind of dicey. But all the pizzas were consistent!
I changed my finger profile to 1/4 open on the last finger, im going to change it back to 1/2 open though I thought the pizzas were superior at 1/2 open to finish.
We par cooked wings today I did 2 passes at 6mins and they came out superb.
One area I need to address is our wraps, we use our pizza dough to make homemade wraps, when I had a deck oven we would throw a 13oz dough ball rolled out to 17” in the oven for about a minute untill it balloned then deflated… doing this in a conveyor is different we are still working on an official way to get the best results in the easiest way.
Also we debating which screens or disks we are going to stick with lloyds hearth or just aluminum screens
An issue has come up with pizza screens, I opened a pizza box to check the pizza and the employee cut the pizza on the screen and boxed it with the pizza.
Then today someone called saying they received a pizza with a screen in the box. Does this happen to anyone else and how did you fix it?
Lol! Happened to me last week. Probably the third time in 6 years. All three times by someone experienced and the screen left the building and came back. Screen count has stayed the same so I’m pretty sure it was just the three times. I just let them know that something like that just shouldn’t happen. All three felt embarrassed that it was them.
If it’s someone fairly new have them cut two pizzas one on a screen and one not. Let them feel the difference.
You can’t do it because you’re finding that the dough balloons up and rolls against the top fingers. You might try heavy docking, that can work. We do much the same as you are doing but we have a deck oven just for that application of baking the flat breads. If your oven has a center door you might also be able to deflate the pocket before its fully formed at the door but I really don’t think it’s a practical approach unless you make them ahead of time (during slack periods) and just reheat them for use by placing them in the center door towards the exit end of the oven as it only takes a few seconds to reheat them.
Tom Lehmann/The Dough Doctor
Hey there, sounds like I’m making the exact switch you made. Going from Blodgetts to Edge. What type/brand chicken wings do you recommend using in those ovens? I could never get wings to turn out well in the Blodgett’s so I’m looking foreword to trying it in the Edge!
Im not sure I can help I buy fresh wings marinate them and precook them by running them through the oven.
When theyre ordered I deep fry them for a few minutes in my gas fryers.