Today's outdoor kitchens are a more elaborate extension of the indoor kitchen and include much more than a simple charcoal grill. Outdoor sinks, pizza ovens, bartops, and more are on many homeowners' wish lists.

Get these tips from Scott Cohen of The Green Scene on how to size an outdoor kitchen appropriately for the space available while meeting all the entertaining and dining needs of the homeowner.   

Take-out pizzas are becoming a thing of the past, as more pizza-loving homeowners are installing concrete pizza ovens in their own backyard kitchens. These radiant-heat wood-fired ovens turn an ordinary pizza into a gourmet delight, with a crispy Italian-style crust and a wood-smoked flavor. One contractor who specializes in concrete pizza ovens is Tom Ralston of Tom Ralston Concrete, Santa Cruz, Calif. He is seeing a definite trend toward outdoor living areas complete with concrete pizza ovens and fire pits. "There's a whole new luxurious atmosphere in entertaining guests and spending time outdoors," he says. Following are some tips and other advice for building the perfect concrete pizza oven for your own projects.

Prevent soggy pizza crusts

Outdoor pizza oven with concrete benches.

The alumina content of the materials used for a pizza oven's components should be a percentage that provides a balance between functionality and strength. Percentages over 40% decrease the oven floor's porosity, inhibiting absorption of steam from raw pizza dough, resulting in a soggy bottom crust.

Use the right oven

Ralston uses oven components from Mugnaini in his concrete pizza ovens because they give pizzas and flat breads a wonderfully crispy bottom crust. They are made of 100% quarried Tuscan refractory terra-cotta clay to attain the high heat and thermal efficiency required for wood-fired baking.

Keep in the heat

The floor of a concrete pizza oven should fit snuggly inside the surrounding walls and overhead crown elements to ensure that the heat in the floor remains within the oven so you get a predictable and consistent floor temperature.

Keep out the smoke

Double-decker concrete pizza oven.

The flue of a pizza oven should begin from just inside the oven and not outside the oven opening. This will capture all the smoke so it won't roll out the oven mouth.

Incorporate curves

The interior walls and overhead crown elements in a concrete pizza oven should have no flat surfaces, which can interfere with airflow. Curved surfaces enhance the convective airflow pattern necessary for a perfectly cooked pizza.

Size the opening appropriately