Ooni Pro Multi-Fueled Outdoor Pizza Oven Review
A backyard pizza oven truly is a thing of beauty. Once you do a little shopping around in this niche, you will also find a lot of other very creative things you can make in them. When it is set up just right, it can replicate pretty much everything that your indoor oven can do, including baking cookies, and even making stews.
The Ooni Pro Multi-Fuel Pizza Oven was designed to be compact, while also being able to achieve high temperatures in a relatively short amount of time. On paper it is a “Quad Fuel” oven, meaning you can use it for wood, charcoal, propane, or wood pellets that heats to 932°F in less than 20 minutes. What you get in the box is an oven set up to burn charcoal and natural wood. I suppose you could put a small pile of wood pellets in the back.
You can also use propane to heat it. Just keep in mind that the propane attachment is an extra expense, and only available as an accessory.
The Ooni Pro does come with some other little handy items including a four-piece baking stone, a thermometer built into the door and a charcoal burner. They even include some basic safety gloves with the initial purchase.
Construction & Ease of Assembly
For being a relatively small outdoor pizza oven, with a very friendly price point, the Ooni Pro still has a lot of quality components. The stainless steel exterior has a nice gleam to it and doesn’t tarnish easily. The interior refractory materials do a good job of radiating the heat. Ooni themselves claim that it’s capable of reaching temperatures over 900 degrees Fahrenheit!
There isn’t a whole lot of assembly to the Ooni Pro. From unpacking the box to getting ready to make your first fire, should take you less than half an hour.
Grilling Performance
When it comes to making your own pizza in a wood-fired oven, you want to start with the fresh moist dough. If you really don’t have the skills to work with yeast and kneading you can get by with a pie from one of the unbaked pizza places. In a pinch, a rising crust frozen pizza will get you by, but I think you’ll find the end product has a hard crust. This is due to the way water and steam affect the crust early on in the baking process.
The interior of this pizza oven is pretty small. Ooni claims that you can make two seven inch pizzas at one time. While this is probably true according to the laws of geometry, I think you would be hard pressed to turn and properly remove two seven inch pizzas without burning your wrist on the door, or dropping one onto the other.
Instead, I would recommend a single pizza in the 12 to 14-inch range. Try to keep the ingredients simple. The more you add to the top the longer it will take for them to properly cook, which puts the crust at increased risk of burning in the intense heat.
Try to think more along the lines of a classic Margherita pizza with buffalo mozzarella, and basil. Perhaps a one topping pepperoni. If you do want a “Saturday Movie-Night” garbage pizza, I would recommend putting the vegetables in a small cast iron pan with some olive oil first. Let them sweat for a couple of minutes in the oven while you dress the rest of the pizza. Then put them still warm onto the pizza and slide it in.
The safety gloves it comes with will technically get the job done. Personally, I would recommend investing some extra money in a high-quality welding glove.
The thermometer in the door isn’t 100% accurate. This might be due to its placement. Most people who bake with outdoor pizza ovens will invest in an infrared thermometer to gauge the temperature of the walls and floor of the chamber.
While the Ooni Pro has technically been tested to go over 900-degrees, a floor temperature of around 600 will bake the perfect pizza. You can kick it up and bake your pizza in about 60 seconds. Wow that’s fast.
Grilling Areas
The Ooni Pro provides 324 square inches of pizza baking space. This is just right for a 13-inch pizza pie. It’s also just wide enough to accept a basic cookie sheet, which is a great way to make the most out of the lingering heat, for a nice little dessert!
Special Features
The propane attachment doesn’t technically come with it. Still, it’s not all that expensive, and it will certainly create a more easy to control heat, that won’t be as prone to roaring high and dying down low.
Ease to Clean
Leftover ash is a frequent issue when cleaning wood-fire or charcoal pizza ovens. The easiest way is to use a piece of sheet metal like a dustpan. However, I think you’ll find it hard to find a strip of sheet metal narrow enough to fit the mouth of the Ooni Pro. Instead, I would recommend waiting until everything as cooled down. Then slip a strip of baking paper or an old silicone baking matt in it. Then sweep the ash onto it for proper disposal.
Warranty
The Ooni Pro comes with a 1-year manufacturer’s warranty. This is a little bit less than what you see from most other competitors in this niche and price range. However, the oven itself is so basic in design that you will notice any faults right out of the box.
Conclusion
The Ooni Pro is light enough that you can use it as a portable pizza oven. While it isn’t the biggest unit in this niche, it is priced right and very easy to use. This could be the ideal pizza oven for a popup restaurant or a mobile catering service.
