Are you ready to use restaurant firewood to tackle wood-fired cooking at your business? Make a fantastic impression on customers with Chicagoland’s finest gourmet firewood for restaurants. Let’s show you where to get good firewood.
We chop our kiln-dried hardwood and fruitwood into pieces that fit in grills, smokers and outdoor pizza ovens. Not only does it excel at cooking food all the way through, but we use the most flavorful, user-friendly hardwood to make it.
With uncanny dryness and high density, our flavorful cooking wood is best for three major reasons.
1. Our Restaurant Firewood Is Practical
Only the right products can do a good job. Many know why our kiln-dried hardwood makes for effective firewood, but fewer know why it’s so effective for cooking. Combining high density with extreme dryness, our restaurant firewood cooks every succulent dish to a turn. Here’s how.
Dryness
Our cooking wood makes starting fires easy because of its exceptional dryness. Not only is our cooking wood more effective than fresh wood, but it’s also a lot drier than any you’d find at a hardware store.
Favoring quantity over quality, most major vendors “season” their wood. Seasoning is nothing beyond letting firewood dry outside for several months. A loose tarp will probably be there to defend the wood from the elements.
Seasoning removes a modicum of moisture, but our kiln-drying process is a lot more effective, removing much more moisture and sterilizing firewood in no more than two days.
Why is kiln-drying important for cooking wood in particular? Since dry wood is easier to light and more likely remain alight, it can provide consistent flames for consistent warmth with which to grill or smoke meat nice and evenly.
Speaking of smoke, moist wood creates more smoke and creosote, both of which are nasty byproducts that can contaminate your food. With our restaurant firewood, you’ll be able to smoke meat, but you won’t have to worry about covering steak in creosote.
Finally, kiln-drying keeps our firewood clean, and your food has to be clean, too. A cheaper option might contain fungus, mold or, worst of all, extra protein (creepy crawlies).
With restaurant firewood, smokers can handle all sorts of different meats
Density
Similar to dryness, density also extends fire duration, but unlike dryness, it causes fires to provide more heat.
How can one discern the density of wood? For starters, you can favor hardwood species, like maple and beech, over softwood species, like pine, fir or cedar. All hardwoods are denser than softwoods. We even offer oak, which is the densest local hardwood.
The reasons for which dense wood makes great fires might be intuitive, but this is also important from a cooking perspective.
The denser the wood, the higher the heat, the more consistent the flames and the longer the duration. In fact, some hardwoods, like hickory, produce fire that’s so hot as to overcook. Hickory is among the most flavorful cooking woods, but we don’t recommend it to newcomers because it requires close attention.
2. Our Restaurant Firewood Brings More Flavor
There’s more to cooking wood than starting and maintaining the best fires. You can also benefit from using wood that creates the most flavorful smoke. Here are a few flavors in our stock we recommend to restaurant owners looking to tackle wood-fired cooking.
Oak
Oak doesn’t have a lot of flavor beside a subtle hint of smoke, which makes it the most versatile. Its ability to pair well with everything makes it perfect for beginners.
Apple
Pairing well with beef, poultry, pork, vegetables and even wild game, apple wood adds hints of fruity sweetness to whatever it cooks.
Cherry
Cherrywood pairs well with mild, light meats like shellfish, poultry, pork and lamb, presenting more of a smoky, fruity flavor.
Hickory
Hickory’s strong fires stand up to dense, red meat. Steak, pork, bacon and ribs are all contenders for hickory’s potent barbecue flavor.
3. Our Restaurant Firewood Fits in All Devices
Our kiln-dried cooking wood fits in all commercial devices from grills to smokers.
We have two available size options. For one-time events or testing the waters, we provide 50-pound bags of cooking wood. For more regular wood-fired cooking, we provide cooking wood by the pallet, which restaurants across Chicago and beyond have found convenient.
Cooking wood for grilling and smoking can reach the standard length of 16 inches, especially considering the industrial devices restaurants employ, but if you need to fuel a device as small as a pizza oven, you can visit our sister company for smaller denominations.
Cooking wood can be small enough for pizza ovens
Restaurant Firewood Delivery to Chicago, IL
There’s a lot more to firewood than fueling fires. Only the driest, densest and most aromatic wood can heat dishes as well as it heats homes.
If you’re ready to pull the trigger on your restaurant’s first annual wood-fired cooking event, Lumberjacks can help. With our four great flavors, we’re ready to send pallets of whatever you need. Delivery across the Chicago region takes anywhere from 1-3 days, after which you’ll be ready to make your new dishes!
Now that you know where to buy good firewood, call us, email us, or fill our form to get started on your order!
