Monday, November 28, 2011

Hillbilly Earth Oven

This earth oven project is evolving into.....well, we're not quite sure WHAT it is evolving into.  All we really know is that we put together a genuine hillbilly, redneck prototype yesterday that failed miserably to do anything other than look very ugly.  If this is what we're going to get as a result of the earth oven project, um...well....maybe we just oughta go look at a train wreck.

We definitely realize there are much easier ways to bake things.  First, there's the propane oven inside the house.  You turn a dial, the oven comes on and, poof, you can bake whatever you want without breaking a sweat.  Next, there's a whole fleet of sturdy, dependable dutch ovens sitting in our shed.  All you do is light coals, insert ingredients into the cast iron apparatus and, poof, you can bake or roast almost anything.  Next, as LBRs know, we perfected baking in the Patio Caddie grill last year.  That little puppy is the perfect outdoor baking machine.  Fire it up, insert whatever you want baked and, poof, there you have it.

So, why the heck are we tilting at the windmills of an earth oven?  That's a very good question and one that was exposed for all its warts yesterday.  We wish we could tell you we had a genuine, honest, logical reason as to why we are building an earth oven when so many other practical, easy, effective and cost efficient making methods are available to us.  Unfortunately, we do not have a good answer to the question.

All we know is that we are doggedly plodding along on our earth oven project, suffering through barely muffled laughing noises from our neighbors and friends, thinking all the while that we are on the earth oven path to perfection.  This earth oven project could easily qualify for one of the dumbest, most useless and expensive projects we've ever dared to undertake.  Perhaps that is its primary purpose--to fully illustrate the folly of tackling such a large scale project without having any real clue as to the "whys & wherefores" hidden within.

Think about this for a minute.  It was only yesterday evening after the failed cornbread experiment that we stood around staring at this hillbilly monstrosity and asked the question, "What DO we really want to bake in this thing?"  Now, don't you suppose we coulda, shoulda, mighta, oughta have asked that question like more than a year ago when this odd ball project actually got underway?  Yeah, that would have been a great idea.  No one in their right mind actually begins a project like this but then again, who has ever said we are in our right mind, anyway?  It doesn't matter, we are going to build an earth oven come heck or high water.  It's too late to back down. It's too late to pull this one out of the fire. It's too late to admit defeat, even though defeat stared us squarely in the face yesterday.  No, to borrow a line from Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers, "We won't back down!"

What do you suppose is next?  Ah, that's right.  We're going to take the whole thing apart and start all over from scratch again.  You know what they say, "Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results each time."  With this earth oven project, Redneck Comedian Jeff Foxworthy would say, "Here's your sign."

One thing we do know for sure, hillbillies every where would be darned proud of us for constructing yesterday's oven. Oh, well, onward and upward, eh?


1 comment:

The Goatherder said...

I don't think it's that ugly. It needs more earth. What about chicken-wiring the whole thing and laying on at least an inch or better two inches of dirt mixed with about 5% portland see-ment?