Ninja Artisan Electric Outdoor Pizza Oven & Air Fryer

Whoever’s in charge of research and development at Ninja clearly had a Swiss-army knife fetish as a kid. Not only can this electric-powered outdoor pizza oven turn out pizza, it can also ‘prove’ the dough beforehand, bake some focaccia for starters, and then air-fry some chicken wings if, by some remote chance, you’re still peckish. Multi-talented doesn’t begin to cover it.

Surprisingly light to lift, the Ninja is supplied with a removeable 30cm square cordierite pizza stone, as well as a large pizza peel, baking tray, plus a mesh air-fry basket that sits on top of it. This doesn’t require mental gymnastics to operate; a quartet of clearly marked touch-sensitive controls select the functions, in concert with a very bright, legible front panel display, plus a usefully loud sounder that issues easily heard alerts.

You can choose from five pizza presets, but we cooked up mostly 9-10in New York types (you can’t squeeze a 12in pizza into this), as well as artisan and thin crust examples. While the Sage Pizzaiolo delivered fractionally better results when it came to delivering pies with authentically leopard-spotted undersides, the Ninja’s were within a whisker of them, at every setting; in all instances, toppings were beautifully and consistently cooked.

While the cooking times and temperatures of the presets were mostly spot on, I still found the built-in illumination, something the Sage lacks, really helpful in giving extra reassurance when the pizzas were done.

Proving my pizza dough balls in the Ninja was straightforward, too, but nowhere as much fun as air-frying a basket of chicken thighs slathered in coffee-flavoured barbeque source, all of which emerged both juicy and evenly cooked. Reheating samosas in a microwave usually results in a soggy, if tasty mess, but the Ninja’s air-fried efforts endowed the pastry with much of the same crispness it had when originally cooked.

When it comes to versatility and value, this Ninja simply knocks it out of the park. Yes, it’s for outdoor-only use (there’s a dedicated stand available for it), but at virtually a third the price of the Sage Pizzaiolo, it ranks as a fantastic mains-powered pizza oven in its own right. Factor in the additional air-fryer and baking talents and it’s a no-brainer.