Holiday Fogon Construction

Welcome to the first post of this Secondary Projects Blog!

On the 28th and 29th of December I, Kai Milanio, and a community Mason, constructed a fogon in the new kicthen of Kai Milanio's house. We built it off of combined experience and knowledge of fogons as well as a book that I had been given by Ricardo, a Peace Corps Trainer. (Sorry I never gave it back Ricardo, I will at the three month check in!)

The style of fogon is common for interior cement floor fogons. You might ask 'Aren't all fogons inside?' Yes technically they are but may are inside thin walled wooden structures with thatch roofs and dirst floors making this style impractical. The reason for this is that with a level floor one can build the storage compartments in the base rather than build a solid base like most fogons in Paraguay.

With the help of the Mason, Kai Milanio and I were able to discuss the desing of the fogon as he whipped through the actually construction. It was truly a dream team. My hope are that the news of the construction of this fogon and its successful inauguration will spread around the community given that the Señora of the house is a member of the Women's Committee.

Fogons commonly have two compartments, the stove and the oven. As you can see in the photos the oven of this fogon in set below the level of the stove. This was done to compensate in the dimensional differences between the oven and the stovetop. The firewood is intserted on the left and the smoke and heat is drawn through to the right and out the wall on the side. It is this heat tha in turn heats the oven and a damper that was also installed will help to regulated the flow of the heat while the oven is in use.

To finish the fogon completely a layer of fine mortart will be applied to the oustide of the fogon and depending on the cost, tile will be put on top of that. Fogons, when built and installed correctly, are the best way to reduce in-home air pollution which is a prevelant problem enywhere that materials other than natural gas or electricity are used as cooking fuel.