I gather from Kevin that it's sort of an all-day thing -- get up, start the fire, let it get really hot, bake bread, let it cool down, roast meat, etc. And while we're planning on having the eat-in area right there, a pizza oven isn't really like having a wood-burning fireplace, since it's designed so most of the fire is contained. You won't be doing a lot of staring into the flickering flames, I think?
I can imagine it being a great family activity -- Sunday is baking day, you know? Make pizza for lunch, bread for the week, a nice big roast for dinner that'll be sandwiches for a few days too. But maybe I'm fooling myself, and what we'll actually be doing on Sunday is running off in four different directions? It's hard to predict what our life will really be like once the children are older...
Good homemade pizza might mean that your children’s friends would want to spend time at your place, so you would not be wondering where your teenagers were and what they were doing so much.
Heh. I’m totally planning on having the ‘cool’ house. 🙂
I have a friend that has the tulikivi woodburning pizza oven and we’ve had some parties at her house around the pizza theme. I don’t think the pizza part is worth it for the expense, and it takes up a huge amount of space. Unless you have a very large room, it’s a monster. The pizza is good, but not so much better than oven-baked pizza that it is worth the $10,000+. If it’s a choice between the pizza oven and the eating area, I would go with the eating area.
I do miss having a woodburning stove in the living area, like we had at our old house. So cozy.
Yes, Kevin’s concerned about the space thing. Our contractor is planning on having her mason build ours, which would help with the expense, but she seems to think it’ll take less room than Kevin thinks it requires. We need to get that nailed down soon, I think, both the cost and the space, before we can really decide.
We might add a woodburning stove in the living room at some point, but that can be decided at a much later date.
PROS
It appeals to you (this is the big pro)
Great for baking bread-type substances
CONS
Takes up space
Expensive to build
Expensive to use (fire-making stuff)
Time-consuming to use (fire-making)
Have to watch kids more carefully while burning (and more hazardous to kids)
May not use much
Can get similar effect lining oven w/ terra cotta tiles