An authentic pizza oven is a fantastic addition to your home. While deciding that you want an outdoor pizza oven is a simple task, making the call on what kind will best suit your needs is much tougher. Some pizza aficionados insist that a wood-fired brick oven is the only reasonable choice.

A traditional brick pizza oven works on the principles of thermal mass and retained heat. When you light the fire in a brick pizza oven, the heat is absorbed by the structure of the oven, stored, and reflected back during cooking.

It takes a lot of time and thermal energy to heat a brick oven properly, but when it reaches that perfect temperature, you’ll get a perfect pizza, but how? Imagine that your pizza will be divided into two parts and all of them must be cooked simultaneously. The pizza base will be cooked in thermal conduction from the bottom, and the toppings will be processed by thermal radiation from the hot bricks. This principle ensures a consistent and even cooking experience. The professional pizza chef must monitor and balance the two parts of pizza so that they are cooked at the same time. Thus the proper temperature plays an important role.

A brick oven will be useful if you have more prep time than cook time. You can stoke a roaring fire, get the oven up to the right temperature, and then worry less about making sure the fire is blazing while you’re cooking. At times, you may have the whole family clamoring for pizzas, but each family member wants a different combination of toppings.  With the brick oven, you don’t have to wait between pizzas to cook the next one, and each one is done in as little as 2 minutes.

You’ll also enjoy a brick pizza oven if you prefer slow cooking. A brick oven can maintain a lower temperature for a longer period of time, allowing you to make great wood-fired recipes that call for a slow bake.

A brick oven also has the additional advantage of an elegant but rustic look. The design, masonry, and architectural elements of a brick oven add so much charm to a home’s outdoor living space.

At Tri-County Hearth & Patio we have a large selection of pizza ovens and supplies.  We are a family-owned and operated business located on Old Washington Road in Waldorf, Maryland, and have been serving the area for over 30 years. We offer our customers the largest selection of patio furniture, fireplaces, inserts, stoves, BBQ grills, and outdoor accessories in all of Southern Maryland. Plus, our sales and service professionals are proficient in all things patio and hearth. Visit our website for more information, or if you’re ready to optimize the enjoyment of your home, give us a call at 301-843-1771.