11419 zoppas cooker

one of the joys to be found here in everyday life is the slow cooking of food... and the second kitchen...

am not recommending these sorts of stoves for the main living areas as they are fickle and often smokey... in fact they require constant cleaning to keep their air flow areas free.... and you will soon end up with very brown paintwork.... and often have to leave a window open in order to breath

for those with a desire to have a wooden cooking element in a modern kitchen much better to choose a modern solution i think

anyway we restored a second kitchen area in our house... well its set off from the house which makes it ideal for smelly cooking... and whilst looking at wood fired cookers i came across this old Zoppas model.... and it almost looked brand new apart from a few bits of wire... and looked much better than some of the more modern alternatives... for example the oven is quite large

the other point is that these things will last forever and cost very little... around the euro 100 mark... you just have to check for any rusted away places in the ovens area... although that can be re welded but in essence there are enough to choose from that you can get a good working model easily enough....

once bought its essential to take it apart around where the smoke is supposed to leave the fire... which extends all the way around the ovens and the water heating area to the side...depending on model i guess ... it also allows you to see the essential points to clean regularly to allow a good flow of heat to the oven...

anyway to my mind if you have the alternate cooking space and have not got one the benefits include cost as against gas... it burns little wood its grate area being small and designed for cooking not for heating... so you do not have to purchase a huge amount of wood... but make sure it will fit the fire area...

food ... a lot of it... will taste better cooked in this way... there may be a scientific reason and its not just because of the slowness... however a benefit is that you can easily leave something to cook slowly most of the day by adding small amounts of fuel ...

the other factor is the top plate... this can be got extremely hot and you can throw whatever meat on top to fast grill ... something that if you do in a normal kitchen even with a hood will end up smoking the house out, leaving a nasty smell and spattering all the tiles with grease..... might well be to my way of thinking why many people have problems with meat here ... as ours always appears to end up tender when cooked either through the slow method or the fast grill...

anyway the model i like is this one

[url=http://www.fabiomoie.it/vetrina/cucine_stufe.htm]fabiomoie.it " Antiquariato e Restauro "[/url]

you have to scroll down to the Zoppas model.... and if like me you think it would fit in well to life here search on the Internet and they are very easy to find.... to me its somewhat like owning a sort of fifties type car... very simple...easy to repair and carries on effortlessley doing what it was built for....

Category
Food & Drink

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Wed, 01/14/2009 - 03:46

Zoppas appliances are very reliable. I think that they are part of the Electrolux brand. When we were renovating our kitchen, we went to the local shop at Bagni and Zoppas were the appliances which were the best for us because of size, etc. We have a kitchen which was complicated to fit because of irregular walls, low window seals, etc. so it had to be custom made. The couple who run the appliances shop at Bagni di Lucca highly recommended Zoppas, as I was not familiar with the name. We are very happy with the results.

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Wed, 01/14/2009 - 15:51

Whilst I can not confirm the brand I have an old stove which looks incredibly similar (I must have a picture but I can't find a single one) and it too is a little less than efficent on the burning, a tad smelly and smoky but that could just be the stove crying out for a decent clean. That said its perfect for those days of leaving food to cook slowly whilst other work is done around the house. Our stove also currently doubles as the main heating source though i am likely to add something which is a bit more efficent and use this as a secondary heating source.

I wonder if it is in itself a Zoppa, Thanks for the information I will go looking for pictures and see if I cant locate some more information as its a feature of the house I wouldn't be without.