- Curing is not optional — skipping it causes cracks that are expensive to repair
- 5–10 fires over 7–14 days — progressively hotter, let the oven cool completely between each
- First fires use paper and kindling only — no hardwood until Day 4+
- The steam you see is normal — it's the moisture leaving the refractory materials
- Small cracks in mortar joints are expected — wide cracks or gaps are not
- After 8–10 fires, your oven is ready for full-temperature pizza cooking
Why curing matters
A newly built or newly installed pizza oven contains significant moisture — from the refractory mortar, the concrete base, and in the case of precast ovens, from the manufacturing process itself. If you fire the oven to 400–500°C on its first use, the rapid vaporisation of this trapped moisture creates pressure that cracks the dome, hearth, or mortar joints. These cracks are not cosmetic — they reduce the structural integrity of the oven, allow heat to escape, and are extremely difficult to repair once they form.
Curing — a series of progressively hotter fires that gradually drive moisture from the structure — prevents this. It takes patience (10–14 days minimum for a new build) but is a fundamental step that experienced installers always insist on before the oven is used for cooking.
The complete curing schedule
Fire 1: Paper only (50–100°C)
Light 3–4 sheets of newspaper only — no kindling, no wood. Let it burn for 30–45 minutes. Watch the oven — you'll see steam rising from the dome and joints. This is the free moisture being driven off. Let the oven cool completely (overnight) before the next fire. If it's raining, wait for a dry day.
Fire 2: Paper + small kindling (80–130°C)
Add a small bundle of very dry kindling (finger-diameter or smaller sticks) to the paper. Burn for 45–60 minutes. More steam will be visible. Remove the ash when cool, check for cracks in mortar joints. Small hairline cracks are normal — note their location. Large gaps or dome movement: contact your installer immediately.
Fire 3: Paper + kindling + small splits (120–180°C)
Add a few small hardwood splits (25–35mm diameter) to the fire. Burn for 60–90 minutes. The oven should be clearly getting drier — less steam than Day 1. Let cool completely. You may notice the oven radiates heat more efficiently already as moisture leaves.
Fires 4–5: Medium hardwood fires (180–280°C)
Build progressively larger fires using split hardwood 50–75mm in diameter. Sessions of 2 hours each. The oven interior (viewed through the opening) should be starting to glow orange-red on the dome. Steam is now minimal. Check mortar joints — small cracks that appeared earlier may have self-healed as the mortar cured under heat.
Fires 6–7: Hot fires (280–380°C)
Full hardwood split fires, building to hot but not maximum temperature. The dome interior is glowing clearly. The temperature is approaching cooking range. The oven is now substantially dry. Push the fire back in the dome to assess the hearth temperature — it should be noticeably hot to hand-proximity 30cm above the surface.
Fires 8–10: Full temperature (380–500°C+)
Build a full-size fire using good hardwood splits. Push to maximum temperature. The dome interior should turn from black soot to light grey/white — this ash-burnoff is a good sign. Your oven is now cured and ready for cooking. Make your first pizza!
How to tell if curing is working correctly
- Steam visible from the dome and joints: Normal in first 3–4 fires — this is moisture leaving. If no steam at all from Day 1, check your oven is new and not already dried from outdoor exposure.
- Small hairline cracks in mortar joints: Normal and expected. The mortar is still curing under heat. Most hairline cracks self-fill during the curing process as refractory mortar expands and contracts.
- Oven warming up faster each session: Good sign — as moisture leaves, less energy is absorbed by vaporisation and more goes into raising temperature.
- The interior turning lighter coloured: As the oven dries, it changes from dark (wet) to lighter grey (dry). Full colour change across the dome interior confirms thorough drying.
Contact your installer if you see: Cracks wider than 2mm in the dome or hearth; movement or shifting of the dome from its original position; the oven mouth tilting or dropping; mortar joints failing completely (not hairline — complete separation). Small hairline cracks are expected and normal. Large structural cracks are not — they indicate a problem with the original installation.
First cook tips
After curing, your first proper pizza session:
- Allow 90 minutes of firing for the full heat-up (longer than once the oven is well-seasoned)
- The dome interior turning from black (soot) to white/grey indicates the oven is at temperature
- Test the hearth temperature by touching flour to the hearth surface — if it instantly chars, you're at cooking temperature
- Push the fire to one side (not extinguish it) and cook your pizza on the clear hearth opposite
- Rotate the pizza every 20–30 seconds — it will cook in 60–90 seconds once the oven is properly hot
- The first 2–3 full sessions will continue the seasoning process — the oven gets better with each use
Three fires is the absolute minimum for a precast oven that arrived dry from the factory. For a custom brick dome that was built wet (using mortar and water in construction), 7–10 fires is more appropriate. Three fires at low temperature followed immediately by a 500°C full firing is insufficient curing for any newly built masonry oven. If in doubt, add more low-temperature fires — there is no downside to additional patience, but there is significant cost to repairing a cracked dome.
If the oven has been saturated by rain before curing, start the curing process from the beginning and allow additional drying time. Do not attempt to rush drying with a large fire — the sudden heat on heavily saturated refractory will cause exactly the cracking you're trying to prevent. Do two or three very small paper-only fires 24 hours apart, watching for steam, before progressing to kindling. The oven will need more curing fires than a dry-installed oven — allow 10–12 fires minimum.