What to Cook dinner in an Ooni Pizza Oven, In keeping with Its Founders

In case you have a pizza oven of any sort, you’ll be able to go forward and thank Ooni. Since Ooni debuted the primary transportable pizza oven in 2012 — a wood-fired mannequin not not like the bestselling Karu 12 — dozens of extra choices have entered the market, together with gasoline and electrical fashions. We’ve introduced greater than 30 pizza ovens to our lab up to now, and whereas we’ve discovered some robust contenders, Ooni continues to high our checks for each outside and indoor pizza ovens. 

Whereas pizza ovens have change into an increasing number of well-liked amongst house cooks, I think about simply as many individuals have requested how typically they’d truly use one. (I do know I’ve.) While you’re delegating invaluable house on the kitchen counter or a small patio, a single-use equipment could appear much less compelling. However I’d evaluate our favourite pizza ovens to good grills — they’ll hit a variety of temperatures for various cooking kinds, and a few even have twin zones, like considered one of Ooni’s latest outside ovens, the Koda 2 Max. And after talking with Ooni’s founders, I can confidently say their pizza ovens can deal with much more than pizza.

Ooni Koda 2 Max Pizza Oven

Ooni began in Scotland because the brainchild of husband and spouse Kristian Tapaninaho and Darina Garland. The founders frequently go to Ooni’s U.S. headquarters in Austin, Texas, the place I stay, and on their most up-to-date journey, I acquired to ask all of them of my (burning) pizza oven questions. Like, what precisely are you able to do with an Ooni moreover making pizza? Because it seems, rather a lot. Listed here are their high ideas. 

Past Baking

If you wish to do as a lot with a pizza oven as attainable, the Koda 2 Max has two pizza stones and two burners that you could set to totally different temperatures. This oven’s patent-pending design achieves next-level even heating, in line with Tapaninaho. “You will get away with a single flip of the pizza, which you’ll be able to’t do on any of our opponents’ ovens, not to mention a standard oven,” he says. Meaning you’ll be able to fireplace up a Neapolitan-style pizza recipe on one aspect and, on the opposite, a New York-style pie at a decrease temperature. But it surely doesn’t cease there: Sourdough loaves, bagels, and chocolate chip cookies all bake superbly within the Ooni, too. 

Baking is only one choice. “With the twin cooking surfaces, you are able to do extravagant roasts with a bread dish on the aspect, and within the again, you too can have a tray of greens,” says Garland. “Cooking issues like salmon, steak, or greens rapidly, it’s like restaurant high quality. We didn’t design it for that, however it’s such a helpful add-on.”

Roasting

“I really like in a short time cooking greens on forged iron,” says Garland, who eats a vegan weight-reduction plan. “It’s actually game-changing to do asparagus, peppers, and onions. In our home oven, it will take about 20 minutes plus to do it properly, however within the Ooni, you are able to do it in three minutes with olive oil and salt. It’s so crisp however completely cooked. The identical applies to issues like salmon. Persons are massive about that.”

Ooni designed a chrome steel roasting pan for the job, which you need to use for mainly something. “The roasting pan has been round for ages, however we discovered that none of them labored rather well in our ovens,” says Tapaninaho. This one has a detachable rack with thick grates that may stand as much as excessive warmth (as much as 750°F) with out warping. Should you’re roasting meat, you’ll love the picket carving board that matches on high of the pan, because it has grooves and a slot to empty the juices again into the pan to attenuate the mess. 

Smoking

Tapaninaho loves smoking meat on the Ooni. He’ll put a 2-inch steak, like a bone-in prime rib, within the roasting pan and cook dinner it low and sluggish for round an hour till it reaches about 120°F. He then takes out the roasting pan to let the steak relaxation earlier than turning the warmth again to excessive. “As you’re getting the oven again as much as tremendous excessive temperatures, get the forged iron into the oven in order that it’s actually sizzling, then throw the steak onto the forged iron within the oven,” he says. “Rapidly sear each side. It’s superior.” 

Store Extra Ooni Pizza Oven Picks:

Ooni Massive Pizza Desk Bundle

Ooni Koda 16 Pizza Oven

Ooni Karu 12G Pizza Oven

Ooni Volt 12 Electrical Pizza Oven

Ooni Bamboo Pizza Peel

Ooni Turning Pizza Peel