The outdoor wood-burning oven with wheels gives great freedom to the amateur pizza maker as it overcomes the limitations of built-in models. Moving the appliance around allows you to experiment with new ways of cooking and different scenery or setting depending on the occasion.
In many articles on our blog, we have explored the wide range of possibilities of outdoor ovens such as the 9 good reasons to choose an Alfa wood-burning model for your terrace.
Years ago, before electric ovens took their place, wood-fired ovens were a staple in homes. Today, they are usually placed outside where there are fewer installation constraints surrounding the flue system and smoke output.
Building a traditional outdoor oven needs masonry work to create a solid foundation and can require a sacrifice of a significant amount of your outdoor space in a definitive way.
For this reason, mobile wood-fired ovens are becoming increasingly popular. Because of the wheel feature on optional carts, you can move the cooking station wherever you want. It doesn’t require any work on our outdoor space and performance is not compromised.
In this article, we will have an in-depth look at mobile outdoor wood-burning appliances to focus on their characteristics and how to make the most of their features. We will start by talking about the innovation of steel ovens that initially made the development of mobile appliances possible reducing their weight.
We will continue by analysing the benefits of wheeled outdoor wood-fired ovens, including the endless possibilities of mobility and other aspects related to ease of use.
We will then survey the different models of Alfa portable wood-fired ovens, outlining their features to understand which is the best solution for your situation.
Finally, we will summarize the main uses of wood-burning ovens with wheels so that you can get the most out of your portable cooking equipment.
The Alfa innovation of the mobile wood-fired oven
Let’s start with the technological development behind the mobile oven, the steel wood-burning oven. As mentioned above, the steel wood-fired model was created to overcome the challenges of building a traditional brick oven: dedicated space and masonry cost.
The Alfa’s ForninoxTM technology is the technology behind the construction of wood-burning ovens with high-quality refractory floor and stainless-steel dome.
Combining the great properties of steel with a design aimed at making the most of the heat generated by the fire, Alfa steel ovens can reach 500 °C in just ten minutes and maintain high temperatures even when cooking large quantities of food.
In addition to their excellent baking performance, they have the big advantage of being way lighter than their wood-burning counterparts, which was actually the guiding factor that prompted the development of portable ovens and the addition of convenient, wheeled bases.
Mobile ovens can be set up in two ways; either on a table or a custom-made support. The former may be the best solution if you have enough space to make pizza close to the oven as in the case of the Alfa’s multifunctional base.
This pizza table is made of robust, lightweight steel; it comes with 4 locking castors and lots of accessories such as hooks for tools and potholders and a large compartment under the worktop to store firewood or a gas cylinder.
The latter, on the other hand, with the oven placed on a made-to-measure wheeled structure, is particularly suitable for moving your equipment around, because it takes up less space than the multifunctional base.
However, you will need an auxiliary table (even a plastic one) as a prep area to stretch and top pizza dough, which you can arrange as you like according to the layout of your outdoor spaces and the best place to put the oven.
Portable models, based on steel ovens technology and designed to facilitate mobility, are high-performing, easy-to-use and extremely versatile cooking tools.
After having seen how the wood-fired oven with wheels works, let us continue by looking at its main advantages.
The benefits of the portable outdoor wood-fired oven
Moving your cooking equipment about opens a world of possibilities and helps realize the full potential of your outdoor space.
We can summarize the 4 major advantages of the portable wood-burning oven:
- Great versatility in setting up cooking stations.
- Use in different locations.
- Space for fuel.
- Easy to put under cover.
Let’s now go over them one by one.
1 . Versatility in setting up cooking stations
The first major advantage of the portable oven is that you can place it in different areas of the yard for each baking session, so that you can change the layout of your cooking station and the seating arrangements for guests each time.
After a few tests, you will be able to understand the best way to arrange the spaces between the oven, the worktop and the areas for eating and mingling.
Do not forget to allow for the wind intensity when choosing the position of the mobile oven. No one wants the smoke from your oven to bother guests or neighbors. Place the back of the appliance facing the wind and away from the eating area.
2. Use in different locations
The portable oven can be situated in the most suitable place in your outdoor space, but it can also be transported anywhere. Thanks to its small size and easy assembly, you can load it into your car and use it wherever you wish.
For instance, we can throw a pizza party at a friend’s home, we can bake the Sunday roast in the family’s country house or heat up the picnic food that we have prepared earlier. Because of this feature, this oven is often the choice of camping and outdoor enthusiasts.
3. Space for fuel
Another plus of the portable pizza oven is the availability of fuel storage space. Both the multifunction table and the custom-made support come with a compartment to store firewood or a gas cylinder.
This allows you to manage the oven with firewood always at hand without the need to leave it unattended. In the case of a gas-burning model, all you need to do is to connect the cylinder and place it in a position that is easy to reach and that doesn’t get in the way of cooking.
4. Easy to put under cover
Traditional brick ovens must withstand cold temperatures, rain, sunshine all year round and, in the long term, such exposure to the elements could damage them.
Portable ovens, on the contrary, can be moved easily and after use they can be stored in a closed space to extend their useful life. Taking care of your appliance will repay you with many years of top performance.
The advantages that we described above make the wood-fired oven with wheels the most convenient cooking tool, especially for occasional use. Those who don’t fire their wood oven often, will certainly find it very helpful to put it away when it is not needed.
Alfa’s outdoor wood-burning ovens with wheels
After talking about the benefits of the mobile oven, let’s take a closer look at the practical applications of the portable wood-fired models. We will narrow the focus on the Alfa ovens that are available as mobile models and go over their main features.
The Alfa range of home ovens includes 8 appliances that can be used as mobile models running on wood that meet different needs depending on your available space and lifestyle.
We can distinguish them into two categories:
- Portable wood-fired ovens
- Portable gas-fired or hybrid ovens.
Although three of the four gas-burning ovens may become hybrid appliances fuelled by firewood, we have grouped them like that for the sake of greater uniformity in comparison.
Let’s begin with mobile outdoor wood-fired ovens.
1. Portable wood-burning ovens
All Alfa’s home wood-fired ovens on wheels are available in three versions:
- Top (the oven only, to be put onto another piece of furniture).
- Top + table (the oven with the Alfa’s pizza table).
- Top + base (the oven with the custom-made, wheeled base).
The changes between the different models are in size, available colours or design style, but they share the same excellent cooking performances.
There are 4 Alfa’s portable wood-burning ovens; let’s list them, starting with the largest and working our way down to the smallest.
- Allegro (it can cook up to 6 pizzas at once; available in antique red and yellow).
- 4 Pizze (as the name implies, it can bake 4 pizzas per batch; available in antique red, copper or grey).
- Ciao (it can bake 2 pizzas; available in grey or yellow).
- 5 Minuti (it cooks 2 pizzas as well; available in antique red or copper).
The next oven is fired by wood, but it belongs to the second group because it also runs on gas.
2. Portable gas-fired or hybrid ovens
The following 4 portable ovens in the Alfa’s home line, also running on gas, are:
- Nano (the smallest in the Alfa range, wood-fired or gas-fired but not hybrid; it’s the only exception among our gas home ovens).
- Brio (it can bake up to 2/3 pizzas at the same time, it’s the only Alfa hybrid model with a customised base).
- Stone Oven (the 2-pizza hybrid model; with its customised base).
To sum up, the last three models share the hybrid kit technology, which allows you to select between the two fuels on a case-by-case basis. The One is only wood-fired or gas-fired.
The Alfa range of home ovens provides you with plenty of choice with 8 portable outdoor appliances that run on firewood.
Make the most of your outdoor kitchen with a mobile oven
The different Alfa ovens can satisfy many needs in different contexts. In fact, you can opt for large appliances, able to bake 4/5 pizzas at a time, more compact ones for cooking 2/3 pies at once, all the way down to the One, the portable model for only one pizza.
Big ovens are for those who have enough space to install high-performance appliances that double up as stylish furniture to decorate their outdoor cooking area. If space is at a premium because you have a balcony or a small terrace, but you don’t want to give up the joy of cooking with wood, compact models are just the ticket.
Another aspect to consider when choosing a mobile pizza oven is your ability to manage the fire. If you are not really into “arte bianca” (the art of bakery as Neapolitan pizza makers call it), it will be hard to get perfect wood-fired cooking at the beginning.
But you will get the hang of it after a while, and it will be easier by using a smaller wood-burning oven. Alfa has solutions for every problem when it comes to organizing your outdoor cooking areas so that you can bake pizzas with a difference.
In another article in our blog, we have already talked about how to furnish an outdoor kitchen and make the most of its space.
We hope we have given you top tips on how to select the best portable wood-fired oven. Keep following our blog to learn more about the world of pizza ovens.
