Pizza is the staple diet of many Australians, and just about every town has a pizza shop the locals swear by. Surprisingly, Australia has not stolen it from Italy as our national dish. We would visit the local pizza shop for years to buy takeout on a Friday or Saturday night. Then, after buying a bread maker, we found we could make our own pizza dough and the family started to enjoy homemade pizza more. One thing that we never got right was the cooking and getting the base just right. Whilst we have watched our friends build or buy fancy pizza ovens, it all seemed too hard. Is that all about to change with the Ooni Volt 12 Electric Pizza Oven?
How is a pizza oven different from a normal oven?
The key difference between a pizza oven and a normal household convection oven is heat. Your home oven will have a maximum temperature of around 250 degrees Celsius. A pizza oven can go as high as 500 degrees Celsius. This lets you cook a pizza in just a few minutes, whilst a convection oven will take up to 15 minutes.
A pizza oven will also have a pizza stone as standard. At the same time, you may use one as an accessory with a convection oven. The dough on the very hot stone ensures your base gets crispy fast, and you will taste the fermentation in the dough. This ensures an authentic taste you previously only had in a pizza shop.
Adding, turning and removing a pizza is best done with a pizza peel. A peel can be made of wood or metal, with the wood version good for launching the pizza into the oven and for placing the cooked delicacy ready for cutting. A metal pizza peel is ideal for removing or turning a pizza once it’s in the oven.
Let’s talk pizza dough
Dough or crust is the foundation of any good pizza. It serves as a base for toppings, no matter your preference. Depending on the recipe, the pizza crust ranges in texture from doughy and chewy to thin and crispy. Yeasted doughs are the most common for pizza, but unraised dough works, too. Various pizza crust styles are within two main categories: yeasted and flatbread.
Each crust has its own style of cooking, slicing, and toppings. For example, Chicago-style pizza is a deep-dish pizza that starts with a yeasted crust and cooks in a high-sided pan. Deep-dish pizza is any pizza that bakes in a pan, allowing the crust to puff up. Detroit-style pizza is a deep-dish, thick-crust pizza with marinara sauce on top of cheese and is cooked on a rectangular, high-sided baking sheet. Flatbread pizzas have a cracker-like crust and often serve as an appetizer with lighter toppings because their structure differs from yeasted crusts.
Some of the popular pizza types include the following:
- Neapolitan pizza: The Italian Neapolitan is a staple. It is a thin-crust pizza cooked in a wood-fired oven with a crispy crust.
- Deep-dish pizza: Bakes in a pan, causing the crust to puff up. The crust cooks in a cast-iron pan or on a high-sided baking sheet.
- Stuffed crust: A yeast pizza dough has a crust stuffed with cheese, sauce, or other filling. It is cooked in a round pizza pan or on a pizza stone.
- New York-style pizza: A chewy, medium-thick crust. It typically cooks in a gas pizza oven with a large, flat bottom.
- Flatbread: Often served as an entree and has lighter toppings. Usually takes longer to get a crispy crust.
- Gluten-free pizza: Dough is made of gluten-free flour, slightly crumblier than normal pizza dough.
- Detroit-style pizza: A rectangular, high-sided pizza served in square slices.
- Sicilian pizza: Like focaccia bread, the dough is thicker and holds oil better for cheese, sausage, and other pizza toppings.
- Chicago-style pizza: A deep-dish pizza style with a yeasted crust. Cooked in a high-sided pan, allowing a buttery crust and plenty of toppings.
What can the Ooni Volt12 do?
The Oonvi Volt12 is a weather-resistant electric pizza oven capable of home-cooking 12-inch pizzas in 90 seconds. Alongside the Meater Plus smart thermometer, it’d create one heck of a one-two punch as part of your kitchen arsenal.
Ooni has a wide range of pizza ovens that run on gas, wood pellets, charcoal, or a combination. The Volt 12 runs exclusively off electricity, drawing up to 1600 watts to reach 450 degrees, which is well within an Australian standard power point limit of 2400 watts. It will automatically power down after 45 minutes of inactivity to conserve power.
Beyond the simplicity of plugging the oven in and being ready to cook in under 20 minutes, it also has precise temperature adjustment, which is far simpler than the other models. Temperature control is also further adjustable via a dial to control the heat directly above the pizza and below the included pizza stone. The oven will automatically decide the right lower and upper balance based on your recipe temperature unless you want to change it manually. A handy timer helps ensure you do not leave your food in for too long.
The Volt 12 can be used indoors or outdoors, although it is recommended to be stored indoors. An optional protective cover is available for $95, which would be useful if stored on a covered balcony.
The construction is high quality but large and heavy per the specifications. A triple-paned glass door lets you watch your pizza cook before your eyes. The exterior is well insulated, and I could place my hand below the oven without discomfort. Still, Ooni does provide some strong warnings about placement and the effects of heat on a table surface.
After cooking each pizza, a boost feature can bring the pizza stone back to cooking temperature, allowing faster, consistent results in your bases.
Ooni Volt 12 specifications
| Capacity | 12-inch Pizza Oven |
| Power | 240 Volts drawing 1600 Watts Max temp 450 degrees Celsius |
| Dimensions | 617mm x 529mm x 279mm 17.8kg |
| Price (RRP) | $1,499 |
| Website | Ooni Australia |
| Warranty | 2 years |
| Manual or Support pages | User guide |
Using the Ooni Volt 12
Before making our first pizza, we watched videos of others using the Ooni. They made it look so easy. Our first challenge was hand stretching the dough as we normally roll it. This had mixed results. Our first pizza went well; we turned after one minute, and in another minute, it was done. Wow, that was fast. Our second pizza had a hole in the base, which ripped open as we launched (yes, you do launch) the pizza into the oven. Toppings fell onto the stone, and that caused a mess.
Our ingredients and dough were the same as in our regular oven the week before. The only difference was the way we stretched the dough and the Ooni. The taste was magnificent. To quote my wife: “How can the same ingredients taste so much better?”
A week later, we tried again with rolled bases without incident, which all turned out to be a much higher standard. A key accessory you must invest in is a pizza peel. We tested the Perforated Peel, which allows you to slide your pizza in and out of the oven and turn it. It can also be used to quickly rescue loose toppings before they burn. The perforations allow flour to fall away and steam to escape, ensuring a crispy crust.
Regarding accessories, many additional items that, although not necessarily make the process easier, include a pizza cutter, an infrared thermometer to measure pizza stone temperature, a dedicated table, a dough scraper, ingredient dishes, gloves, scales, and cookbooks.
Something for perhaps a future review is the ability to cook meat, seafood and vegetables in the oven using a cast iron pan.
The Ooni provides the right equipment; the real trick is getting the dough and the ingredients right. For those needing a little extra help, Oomi provides an app with dough calculator recipes and tips.
Who is the Ooni Volt 12 for?
If you enjoy a proper pizza shop pizza, the Ooni Volt 12 is the perfect DIY pizza oven to get consistent results without fuss with authentic flavours.
Ready in less than 20 minutes from plugging into a power point, pizza can be cooked in 90 seconds whether you are entertaining or just looking for a quick eat during the Friday night footy.
Dough preparation uses simple ingredients, including flour, water and yeast, stretching the dough, an art form that improves with practice. Toppings can be savoury or sweet and can even be mixed, such as the controversial pineapple.
Best of all, Ooni are so confident in their Pizza ovens that if you are unhappy, they will refund your money within 60 days of purchase. It may be expensive, but the Ooni Volt 12 certainly produces high-quality results.
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