Since our stock of the new Outback Pizza Oven arrived I have been desperate to try it out. Today was the day, I bought enough pizza bases to feed the 5000, (yes I cheated usually I would make my own dough but on this occasion with doing so many I didn’t want to be at it all day).
The Pizza Oven was assembled, lovingly done by resident BBQ builder Jordan from our warehouse team. It was quite a simple process and did not take too long to build which Jordan was very pleased with.
The oven appears to be sturdy and stable. The handle to the side and wheels makes it fairly easy to move around - considering we moved the Pizza Oven up a grass bank to cook it was very easy to do! I think it looks great and would look good on any patio.
I started with an Outback charcoal starter, (I think it is always good to use really good quality charcoal so it burns well and for a long time, I used Pro Q Cocoshell Briquettes for a long lasting heat supply). Once the charcoal was going I had an assistant hold the charcoal door at an angle with tongues to be safe and tipped in the lit charcoal. I then used the tongues to spread out the charcoal – I started with most of it under the pizza stone. However as it was my first time and was getting used to it I think it is better to spread out the charcoal across the whole base. This works better than all directly under the pizza stone as more of an all-round cook, the first few I burnt the bases. The pizza stone going long ways front to back is the way forward to allow more circulation to the sides. You can play around with the vents on the chimney and on the door to get your temperature right.
We assembled our pizza’s with toppings of our choice including mozzarella, pepperoni, mushrooms, basil, pineapple, ham and used a pizza paddle to place them into the oven. Allow about 5 mins per pizza depending on your base thickness and remember…if your lookin’ it isn’t cookin’!
In total I made 20 Pizza’s today and managed this with 1 fill of the charcoal starter. All in all everyone was pleased with how their pizza tasted and I was pleased with the ease of use and performance of the Pizza Oven.
The pizza oven has a total cooking area of 49cm x 34 cm it can be used as a charcoal grill also, it might be a bit tricky getting the food in and out so I would suggest this as a back up to grilling not as your main BBQ option, I think at a lower heat you could easily be wrapping potatoes in foil for baked potatoes in this too – they would be delish.
I would recommend this product if you are a pizza lover!
