The Ultimate Guide to Home Pizza Equipment -

If you’ve ever dreamed of recreating a perfect pizza at home then you will need to make sure you have the right equipment. This guide is designed to help you understand the various options which are available to you and hopefully give you the information you need in order to choose the right pizza oven and equipment to suit your needs.

Home Pizza Ovens

Pizza ovens have revolutionized the way we enjoy this beloved dish, bringing the authentic taste and experience of a pizzeria right to our homes. These versatile appliances range from compact electric models perfect for indoor use to traditional wood-fired ovens that offer a rustic, artisanal touch. With a home pizza oven, you can achieve the high temperatures needed to create that perfect crispy crust and melty cheese, all while experimenting with various cooking techniques and flavors. Whether you’re a passionate home cook or a casual pizza lover, investing in a home pizza oven opens up a world of culinary creativity and ensures that every pizza night is an unforgettable event.

So what pizza ovens are out there and which would suit your needs? The answer to the first part of that question is – a lot.

Pizza ovens seems to have sprung up everywhere, although there are two main brands which seem to be grabbing people’s imagination thanks to their excellent social media presence.

First up is Ooni, a popular brand known for their high-quality, portable pizza ovens that cater to both indoor and outdoor use.

Here are some key features of Ooni pizza ovens:

Variety of Fuel Options: Ooni offers multi-fuel ovens that can use wood, charcoal, and gas, as well as electric models for indoor use.
High Temperatures: Their ovens can reach temperatures up to 500°C (932°F), allowing you to cook pizzas in just 90 seconds.
Portability: Many of their models are designed to be portable, making them perfect for outdoor gatherings or even taking on camping trips.
Versatility: You can cook not only pizzas but also veggies, meats, and desserts in an Ooni oven.
User-Friendly: Ooni ovens are designed to be easy to use, even for beginners, with features like a large cooking area and full glass doors for easy monitoring.

Some popular models include the Ooni Karu 16 Multi-Fuel Pizza Oven, Ooni Koda 12 Gas Powered Pizza Oven, and Ooni Fyra 12 Wood Pellet Pizza Oven, although they have many many more. You can see the full range here (and get 10% off using the link).

Ooni’s largest oven is the Ooni Koda 2 Max Gas Powered Pizza Oven.

The Ooni Koda 2 Max Gas Powered Pizza Oven is a fantastic option if you would like to bake two pizzas at once.

Here are some key features:

Large Cooking Area: With a 24-inch cooking area, it can cook two 12-inch pizzas or three 10-inch pizzas simultaneously.
Dual-Zone Cooking: It has two independently controlled gas burners, allowing you to cook at different temperatures in each zone. This means you can cook pizza on one side while slow-cooking meats or veggies on the other2.
High Temperatures: It can reach temperatures up to 500°C (950°F), cooking pizzas in as little as 60 seconds.
Ooni G2 Gas Technology: This technology ensures even heat distribution across the oven, providing consistent cooking results.
Digital Temperature Hub: This feature provides real-time temperature readings, so you know exactly when your pizza is ready.
Portable and Easy to Use: Despite its large size, it’s designed to be portable and easy to set up, making it perfect for outdoor gatherings1.

Overall, the Ooni Koda 2 Max is a versatile and powerful pizza oven that can handle a variety of cooking tasks, making it a great addition to any kitchen or outdoor space.

Ooni also has the Ooni Karu 16 Multi-Fuel Pizza Oven, a versatile and powerful outdoor cooking appliance with a spacious 16-inch cooking area, allowing you to cook large pizzas and other substantial dishes.

One of the stand out features of this oven is that it offers you the ability to cook with wood, charcoal, or gas (with the optional Gas Burner for Ooni Karu 16). This flexibility lets you choose your preferred fuel based on convenience and flavor.

The oven can reach temperatures up to 500°C (950°F) in just 15 minutes, while a hinged oven door provides visibility and control over the flame, making it easier to monitor your cooking.

Other features includes a mounted digital thermometer display and thanks to the large internal space, the ability to cook roasted meats, seared vegetables, and even fresh bread.

It is worth researching Ooni’s other ovens to decide which one would suit your needs if you decide this is the brand for you, as they offer ovens in all shapes and sizes, even including an Indoor electric pizza oven.

The other main player in the home pizza oven market is Gozney.

Having started off with offering traditional pizza ovens to restaurants, Gozney first hit the consumer market with the Roccbox, a small, portable pizza oven which is fantastic for use both at home and on the road.

Many people have started a business with this oven thanks to it’s portability.

Here are some key features:

Safety Features: The oven has a safe-touch silicone jacket to reduce the risk of burns

High Heat Retention: With dense insulation and a double-layered stone floor, the Roccbox can reach temperatures up to 950°F (500°C) and maintain consistent heat for cooking multiple pizzas back-to-back.

Dual-Fuel Capability: It comes with a propane gas burner as standard, and you can also purchase a detachable wood burner for those who prefer the authentic taste of wood-fired pizza.

Portable Design: The Roccbox features retractable legs and a detachable burner, making it easy to transport and set up anywhere.

Built-in Thermometer: A precision underfloor thermometer helps you monitor the cooking temperature accurately.

Restaurant-Quality Performance: Engineered to replicate the performance of Gozney’s professional ovens, it’s designed to deliver restaurant-quality pizzas at home.

While the Roccbox is fantastic, those who cook pizza at home more often will likely enjoy a larger oven and Gozney has you covered here too with both the Gozney Dome and the Gozney Arc and Arc XL.

The Gozney Arc and XL are top-of-the-line pizza ovens designed for serious pizza enthusiasts featuring a Large Cooking Area (The XL can cook 16-inch pizzas), as well as a innovative lateral burner which creates a flame that rolls across the oven’s domed ceiling, replicating the wood-fired experience.

These ovens really are built to last with commercial grade materials, meaning you’ll be cooking pizza in it for a long time without any issues.

You can see our review of this oven below, including us making a 16″ pizza to try it out.

Another of our favourite ovens is the Gozney Dome. This was Gozney’s first large oven and while the Arc is gas only, the Dome offers the versatility of being able to cook with both gas and wood.

The Dome is large enough to cook a 14″ pizza while still fitting in large chunks of wood, making for a more traditional and authentic pizza baking experience. It’s a more expensive oven than those mentioned so far, but it is likely the most versatile too, thanks to it offering great heat retention, especially with the optional door.

We’ve been using the Gozney Dome for a long time and have many videos and reviews on our channel.

There are many other pizza oven brands out there, from cheap, generic brands to the more expensive, better known brands. Some of these include: Breville, DeliVita, Inferno, Clementino and Igneus. In fact even Gino D’Acampo has his own pizza oven range, if you prefer a celebrity endorsed way of cooking.

So you have a pizza oven. But it doesn’t end there as you’ll need some equipment to get the most out of your home pizza making experience.

One of the most essential pieces of equipment is a pizza peel. These come in a variety of sizes and should be chosen based on the size of your pizza oven opening and if large enough, the size of the pizza you would like to make.

Some ovens come with a small peel, but in general you will need to buy one.

The standard peel is 12″, although they can also come in 14″, 16″ and even 20″ varieties, although chances are for a home oven the biggest you will need is a 16″ peel.

Most brands such as Ooni and Gozney have their own range, although we swear by the traditional manufacturer Gi Metal, which while the most expensive, offer the best peels around by far.

You can find the full range of Gi Metal Peels here and see our guide to these peels and more in the video below.

It’s worth noting that peels come in all different forms. Some are solid metal, while others are perforated to let any excess flour fall before entering the oven. You can also get wooden peels, which are great for beginners as the dough does not stick to these, making it easier to launch the pizzas. You can even double up a wooden peel as a cutting board.

Really the choice comes down to personal preference.

For the more advanced user, there is also the turning peel. This piece of equipment does what it says, in that it is used to turn the pizza, without having to take it out of the oven. Again, most brands have their own, although we do tend to stick with Gi Metal.

Turning Peels aren’t exactly essential, but once you get used to making a pizza with one, you will never go back.

Of course if you have a pizza oven, the other main essential you will need is fuel. If you have opted for a Gas oven, this is simple enough, but if you have went multifuel and would like to use wood, then it’d be wise to stock up on Firelighter, Kindling and some quality Kiln Dried Wood.

We buy our wood in bulk, but there are some fantastic retailers, such as Love Logs, who offer wood cut to size for all manner of pizza ovens, and even offer starter sets.

So what else do you need? Well, there is all manner of equipment out there. So let us start with the most obvious items and show you some of the equipment we use, which isn’t necessarily essential, but is useful to have.

First up, you’ll need to be able to cut your pizza once you have baked it. For this, our go too is the Gozney Pizza Cutter, a traditional wheel based cutter, which has a high quality build and keeps sharp over time.

We’ve also used Ooni’s pizza cutter, which is much cheaper, but in all honesty works just as well.

If you prefer the rocker route, then, both Gozney and Ooni offer their own version, but in all honesty you can get generic versions too, which likely work just as well.

Another essential is some sort of storage in which you can prove your dough. There are many options here, as some people like to prove dough in a Dough Tray, while others (like us), prefer to use a container. You can buy dough trays from Amazon and other retailers, or if you prefer something a little fancier, then Gozney sells one which has a thermometer build in to let you monitor the temperature of your dough.

To be honest, we just use some cheap tubs from IKEA to prove our dough. The reason being, they are easy to store in the fridge and if you want to freeze the dough, then they are already in the tub.

You can also go the silicone route and buy some tubs from Babadoh. While we don’t particularly like these for proving dough, as it tends to stick, in our opinion they are essential for other things, such as storing ingredients, sauce etc. We absolutely swear by these and wouldn’t go without them. If you do buy these, they know that six of them fit perfectly in Babadoh’s own dough tray. Which is quite handy.

Other equipment we use includes this fantastic pizza mat from Amazon, which is brilliant, because not only does it offer a guide to allow you to get your pizza the correct size and keep it round, but it also helps keep your kitchen top a little cleaner too.

One last piece of equipment which will help make your efforts look all the more authentic is a pizza board. Again, you can buy these from Ooni, Gozney or even go more upmarket with a fancy maple board. You can spend as much or as little as you like here, or not bother and just cut your pizza on the kitchen worktop. It’s up to you really.

You could honestly keep buying lots of equipment to make life easier. We have all manner of pots, peels, cutters and pizza boards, but as long as you have the oven, fuel, a peel, somewhere to store your dough and ingredients and a way to cut your pizza, then you’ll be making fantastic food without any hassle in no time.

Just remember, if you need any guidance at all, our pizza channel is a fantastic place to pick up some tips and ideas, including pizza dough recipes, reviews and more.