There is almost no appliance we love more than our outdoor pizza oven. Easy to use, incredibly cool, and delivering real-deal Neapolitan pizza in 60 seconds or less, we’re big fans of the Ooni Koda 16 from Ooni Pizza Ovens. But, as a self-professed homemade pizza connoisseur, we’re always on the hunt for products that promise a better at-home pizza-making – and eating! – experience. So, our quest for the perfect pie led us to the Gozney Roccbox.
First introduced in 2016 as the “world’s first restaurant-quality portable pizza oven for your backyard,” the Roccbox Pizza Oven has been a popular option for home cooks and professional chefs for years. We’re running through all the specifics, pros, and cons below, but just know that if you’re searching for a more authentic way to make pizza at home, the Roccbox is definitely an oven to consider.
Buy The Gozney Roccbox Pizza Oven
About Gozney
Gozney
The Gozney story begins with Tom Gozney. A guy with a serious passion for good food, good pizza, and the ancient practice of cooking with stone and live fire, Tom Gozney founded The Stone Bake Oven Company in 2010 – later changed to Gozney in 2018. He and his team have been creating a variety of commercial-grade and residential wood-fired and gas-powered ovens ever since.
Used in professional kitchens, gardens, backyards, and patios all over the world, Gozney is a brand that chefs and home cooks trust to deliver delicious stone-baked meals. While Gozney ovens are used around the globe, the majority of its products are manufactured and available only in Europe. The Gozney Roccbox changed that.
Buy The Gozney Roccbox Pizza Oven
The Gozney Roccbox
Gozney
Introduced in 2016, the Roccbox is essentially a miniaturized and portable version of a full-size pizza oven. Using the same technology and materials as Gozney’s professional-grade ovens, this option boasts an unmatched cooking experience that offers users the opportunity to bring some restaurant-quality magic home to their own backyard.
Available in both gray and green, the Roccbox is appealing for its simplicity, versatility, and fast cooking times. Equipped with two separate fuel attachments – a gas burner and a wood burner – this oven reaches cooking temperatures as high as 950-degrees F within 30-35 minutes. The temperature is also adjustable. For those wondering, 950-degrees F is the sweet spot for good pizza.
Designed with patented rolling flame technology, layers of dense insulation, and a 19mm cordierite stone floor for superior heat retention, the Roccbox mimics the effects of a traditional pizza oven and cooks a 12-inch pizza within 60 seconds. It also comes with a built-in thermometer for easy temperature tracking and reading, retractable legs for easy transportation and set-up, and a safe-touch silicone jacket that reduces the risk of skin burns.
Sounds pretty great, doesn’t it? Having had the opportunity to cook with the Roccbox, we can see why this is a popular seller with home cooks, professional chefs, and pizza aficionados. And, as much as we love our Ooni Pizza Oven, we were completely impressed with the Roccbox. Is it perfect? No. But, nothing ever is.
The Pros
Pizza in 60 Seconds: the rumors and marketing pitches are true. The Roccbox delivers perfectly delicious, restaurant-quality, Neopolitan-inspired pizza in just 60 seconds – maybe even a little faster. As much as we love and brag about our Ooni Pizza Oven, we have to admit, the Roccbox serves up pies that are just as delicious.
The Design: from the materials used to the incorporated technology to the overall aesthetic, the Roccbox works and feels like a legitimate pizza oven. A number of our friends who own their own pizza ovens even remarked on how much it seems like the “real deal.”
Sure, it’s not as portable as other pizza ovens (details below), and the wood burner isn’t perfect (details below), but this is a great backyard cooking appliance. It even makes more than just pizza. Bake bread, sear steaks, cook fish – you name it, the Roccbox can handle it.
Something else special to note: thanks to the silicone safe-touch sleeve, the top of the oven doesn’t get hot. As an accident-prone home cook, we like that.
Gas Burner: much like our experience with Ooni, the Roccbox gas burner attachment replicates the cooking process of a traditional pizza oven and offers up all kinds of wood-fired-inspired flavor. The attachment is also easy to use, easy to install and comes ready to cook with right out of the box. While it doesn’t heat up as quickly as advertised (details below), it’s hard to beat the delicious results.
Built-In Thermometer: easy to use, and easy to read, the built-in thermometer takes the guesswork out of knowing whether the oven is ready to cook with or not. Honestly, we think it’s one of the coolest design features Gozney included in this model and we wish the Ooni Koda 16 had a similar feature.
The Cons
It’s Heavy: our biggest concern with the Gozney Roccbox is the weight. It’s a beast. Especially when compared to other portable pizza oven models. Weighing in around 45 pounds, it’s definitely not as portable as advertised. So, if you’re someone who has dreams of jetting off on adventures with an oven in tow, we’d recommend a lighter option.
Wood Burner: honestly, we were the most excited to test out the wood burner. The included attachment, which was introduced in 2020, is boasted as having an improved design that’s larger, faster, and more efficient than the original model. While we are definitely aware of the amount of time it takes to heat up an oven using live flames from a wood source, we didn’t expect it to take as long as it did, especially considering the size of the oven.
After about an hour of stoking and feeding the flames, we ended up going through our stock of hardwood kindling (recommended by Gozney) and only reached 597-degrees F. We were hungry, so we decided to cut our losses and cook the pizza anyway. While the oven was technically hot enough to cook our meal, it definitely wasn’t ready in 60 seconds. Could this have been a user error? Oh, you betcha. It’s for that reason we’re currently researching better ways to fire up the wood burner. It’s just too cool of a feature, and too authentic of a process, to be a one-and-done experiment.
Heat-Up Time: while we found the gas burner to be a more efficient cooking method, the manual stated that it should take about 15-20 minutes to heat up to 950-degrees F. In reality, it took about 30-35 minutes to reach that temperature. This isn’t a huge concern considering the delicious results, but it’s something to note as you’re planning out the timing of your pizza party.
Our Review
All in all, we like the Gozney Roccbox. We like it a lot. We found the oven easy to set up and operate, easy to cook with, and appreciated the user manuals step-by-step guide. There’s even an included recipe book for some inspiration – bonus!
We consider this a great option for home cooks and professional chefs looking for a more authentic way to make pizza at home and recommend it to anyone shopping for a pizza oven right now.
While it’s too heavy in our opinion to be considered the best portable option on the market today, and while other models offer better wood-burning features, the overall design is hard to beat. Gozney’s patented rolling flame technology is pretty incredible, too. This oven definitely made some of the best pizza we’ve had outside of Italy.
Will we cook with it again? Oh, for sure.
Price: $499
Please note that stock is currently limited. Orders placed now will be delivered in 10-15 business days. The Roccbox is also currently available on Amazon.
Buy The Gozney Roccbox Pizza Oven
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