Buying guide for Best indoor pizza ovens
It’s hard to top the taste and freshness of a pizzeria pizza but buying takeout pizza once a week soon adds up. With an indoor pizza oven at your disposal, you can learn to make pizzas every bit as delicious as those from your favorite pizzeria. Not only will this save you money, you can tailor your pizzas exactly how you like them, experiment with toppings, and try a range of pizza styles.
Indoor pizza ovens need the right cooking surface and well-positioned heating elements for the best results. A quality indoor pizza oven must reach a high internal temperature; otherwise, you might as well use your regular oven and a pizza stone. Size is important, too: most folks agree the right pizza oven is large enough to accommodate a decent-size pizza but not so large that it takes up the entire countertop.
Key considerations
Cooking surface
The cooking surface of a pizza oven is also known as the deck. An oven with a stone deck replicates that of a traditional brick floor pizza oven. It heats evenly, and the porous base draws moisture out of the base, resulting in a crisp crust without sogginess. Some users don't like the fact that stone cooking surfaces can stain and seem tricky to clean. However, all you need to do is scrape off any stuck-on food after use, and the high heat of the oven will keep them sanitary.
Thick steel cooking surfaces work about as well as stone decks, but these should be at least 0.15 inches thick to retain enough heat to make the base sufficiently crisp. If you’re on a tight budget, you could consider a pizza oven with a nonstick coated cooking surface. However, a nonstick surface would most likely scratch and peel over time.
Expert tip
Use 00 flour (a type of finely ground flour) to make your pizza crust, then use less expensive flour, like all-purpose, to dust the pan and any pizza peel you might use.
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Heating elements
For the ultimate results, a pizza oven needs both top and bottom heating elements. The bottom heating element helps crisp up the underside of the pizza while the top element ensures your toppings cook to perfection and the crust is just right. Although this is usually only an option with high-end indoor pizza ovens, you should ideally be able to control the top and bottom heating elements independently. Occasionally, you'll find your toppings and crust are cooked while the underside is still too pale, or the underside is overly charred while the top of your pizza still needs more cooking time. A pizza oven with independently controlled top and bottom heating elements allows you to work around this issue.
Maximum temperature
What makes an indoor pizza oven stand apart from other ovens is the high maximum temperature. The average home oven only reaches 450°F, while quality indoor pizza ovens reach between 550°F and 800°F. Bear in mind that a wood-fired oven used to cook Neapolitan pizzas should reach roughly 750°F on the cooking surface and 900°F in the dome, whereas New York pizzas are usually cooked at somewhere between 550°F and 600°F.
Size
Indoor pizza ovens are designed to be used on the countertop, so most are around the width of a toaster oven or a large microwave, but they may not be as tall. The exterior dimensions are less important than the interior dimensions. At the very least, an indoor pizza oven should accommodate an 11-inch or 12-inch pie, but you can find large models that make pizzas up to 14 or 16 inches in diameter. Consider your preference for pizza size before you buy.
Caution
It is unsafe to use an outdoor pizza oven indoors due to the potential of carbon monoxide poisoning.
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Features
Thermostat
Some pizza ovens have thermostats that allow you to set a precise temperature. Others simply have low, medium, and high settings, so it's more of a guessing game. Either way, we recommend buying a laser thermometer to check the temperature inside the oven.
Timer
You can find pizza ovens with built-in timers so you don't accidentally leave your pizza in too long. It's not an essential feature, however, since you could also use a kitchen timer, the timer on your oven, or the timer on your phone.
Crust settings
High-end indoor pizza ovens occasionally have built-in settings for different types of crust, such as New York, Chicago, or Neapolitan. This means it doesn't matter if you don't know the right temperature settings at which to cook various styles of pizza — the oven does the work for you.
When transferring your uncooked pizza to your pizza oven, use a thin layer of semolina on the peel to prevent sticking.
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Indoor pizza oven prices
Inexpensive
The least-expensive indoor pizza ovens cost between $50 and $200. However, the majority of those under $100 don't produce results that are much better than a standard oven.
Mid-priced
To get a mid-range pizza oven that can produce restaurant-quality results with little practice, expect to pay between $200 and $500.
Expensive
The priciest indoor pizza ovens cost between $500 and $1,000. These reach extremely high temperatures and make pizzas as good as you'd get from a pizzeria with minimal effort. They may have a larger capacity than average or useful extra features.
Expert tip
Keep your dough as pliable but as unsticky as possible. A sticky dough can make removing the pizza from the oven difficult.
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Tips
- Consider how often you are likely to use your indoor pizza oven. If you anticipate making homemade pizza at least once a week for the whole family or hosting regular pizza parties, it's worth spending out a fair chunk. Conversely, it’s not practical to spend a huge amount on something you will only use a few times a year.
- A pizza oven will produce better pies than you can make in a standard oven, but it can only do so much. The quality of your ingredients affects taste, too. You may need to spend some time perfecting your pizza dough recipe and focus on choosing quality ingredients, like San Marzano tomatoes to make your sauce.
- The majority of indoor pizza ovens can only accommodate one pizza at a time. However, since they can cook a homemade pizza from scratch in as little as three minutes, it is easy enough to make multiple pizzas without too much of a wait. If cooking for a large group, it makes sense to share pizzas rather than waiting to serve everyone an individual pizza.
FAQ
Q. What's the difference between home indoor pizza ovens and commercial indoor pizza ovens?
A. The first obvious difference between a home indoor pizza oven and a commercial indoor pizza oven is the size. The majority of home pizza ovens are freestanding and designed to fit on a countertop, while commercial pizza ovens are more likely to be built-in and the size of a conventional oven or larger. Home indoor pizza ovens can usually only cook one pizza at a time, whereas commercial pizza ovens can cook multiple pizzas at once, which is a necessity in a pizzeria kitchen. You also have more fuel options with commercial indoor pizza ovens — home indoor pizza ovens are almost exclusively electric while commercial options can also be gas-powered, wood-fired, or even coal-fired.
Expert tip
Some ovens have lids, limiting the number of toppings you can put on your pizza. Consider this when shopping for an indoor pizza oven.
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Q. Why should I buy an indoor pizza oven rather than using my regular oven to cook pizza?
A. Indoor pizza ovens generally cook at least 150 to 200 degrees hotter than standard ovens, giving pizzas a crispy base and light interior that you'd struggle to get from a regular oven. When you cook pizza in a regular oven at full temperature, the toppings often start to burn, and the top of the crust may darken too much before the underside of the base has become sufficiently crisp. If you cook at a lower temperature to prevent the top of the pizza from cooking too quickly, the whole pizza can dry out rather than having a soft, light interior. Basically, you get better results from an indoor pizza oven, which can rival restaurant-quality pizza.
Q. What types of pizzas can I cook in an indoor pizza oven?
A. You can cook most types of thin-crust pizza in an indoor pizza oven, such as New York and Roma pizzas. Some indoor pizza ovens can also accommodate thick-crust pizzas such as Chicago and general deep-dish pizzas. Although Neapolitan pizza technically must be cooked in a wood-fired oven, you can make something close to a Neapolitan pizza if your indoor pizza oven reaches 750°F or more.
