PIZZA: THE PERFECT MEAL
Ooni Koda Gas-Powered Outdoor Pizza Oven
Pizza is one of the rare foods that seems to make everyone happy. There are countless recipes and styles, including New York, Chicago, and Sicilian, just to name a few. Numerous memes have sprung from the open-faced baked pie layered with sauce, cheese, toplight-weight, toppings, and various garnishes. “You cannot make everyone happy. You are not pizza.”
Until recently, having pizza while traveling, camping, or from your backyard would require a bit of skill, an oven or cast-iron skillet, and a lot of luck to achieve the perfect slightly crispy crust, soft doughy base, and harmony between the sauce, cheese, and toppings. It’s a meal that is easily shared and requires no side dishes. Pizza after a day of adventuring is the ultimate treat while sitting around the campfire, from the tailgate of a truck or from the comfort of a tent.
Enter Ooni, the brand behind the popular portable pizza oven. The Ooni Koda is a lightweight, portable, gas-powered pizza oven that is ready to use right out of the box. Crafted from a commercial-grade, coldrolled carbon steel shell with a high-temperature resistant powdercoated finish, the Koda is as stylish as it is convenient. Ooni has other sizes and options from their line of pizza ovens, including a larger Koda 16 and wood and charcoal burning options. The beauty of this Ooni Koda stove is that it’s gas powered, which allows you to bring it to locations where wood fires aren’t allowed.
Weighing slightly over 20 pounds, the Koda is portable yet has enough weight to withstand the wind. The three legs easily fold in to help save space when not in use and while traveling. The Koda is relative in size to many portable outdoor stoves on the market. It’s not necessarily large nor small but can easily pack next to a cooler or fridge within a vehicle, inside a large drawer system, such as the Front Runner Outfitters system, or in a larger cargo box. There is an optional carry cover available and is something to consider to both protect the exterior and help carry it from the vehicle to the campsite.
The Koda is ready to use right out of the box with no assembly required. You simply fold open the three legs, insert the stone baking board, and connect it to a gas tank. The oven works with standard-sized propane tanks or smaller 1-pound tanks with an adapter. We paired it with the compact and portable Ignik Gas Growler Deluxe and it has worked well together, having now cooked over a half-dozen pizzas with enough gas for more.
Once the oven’s flame is ignited it takes a few minutes for the cordierite stone baking board to get to cooking temperature. The stone baking board provides enough space to cook a 12-inch pizza. Using the laser pointer on the Ooni infrared thermometer (sold separately), the surface temperature of the baking board can be accurately measured, ensuring that you put the pizza in at the optimal time. The adjustable heat control dial makes it easy to control the temperature and internal flame.
A pizza peel is highly recommended to safely insert the pizza into the extremely hot oven. Once inserted it only takes a few minutes to cook the pizza. You’ll start to visually see the cheese bubble as the aroma of fresh dough and cheese wafts through the campsite. The tricky part is knowing when and how to rotate the pizza to ensure it cooks evenly. This does take some getting used to, but soon you’ll become a pizza-making pro.
Ooni offers an app that is full of useful information, from recipes, videos with tips and product info, and even a calculator that helps determine the right proportions for making pizza from scratch. For my camping trip to the Grand Canyon I opted to keep things simple and quick and purchased pre-made dough, sauce, and toppings from Trader Joe’s.
After spending some time with the Koda, I can con dently say that it’s an amazing option for aspiring camp chefs, tailgaters, and backyard cooks. The portability makes it great as a travel companion, although you’ll want to make sure to pack all the necessary accessories and pizza-making ingredients. The oven is easy enough to use but the actual cooking requires some patience and skill to get the pizza perfect. It does take up precious cargo space, but if you have the room, it’s well-worth bringing on your next trip to enjoy the ame-cooked avor of pizza when in the outdoors.