George Mills:
GM I am not an operator so as I have stated before I only speak of feedback I have had from Hundreds of clients.
Rotoflex is a variation of the Farris wheel ovens used in bakeries. Rotoflex ovens revolve rather than rotate. Twenty five years back the use of the rotating oven was quite common in pizzerias. Little Caesar’s Had that Farris wheel type oven in many of their shop.
Ask your self, why none of the top pizza chains use Rotoflex? They can afford to use the very best?
Apparently the reasons are about the same as why the Farris wheel type was dropped. The oven does not know when a pizza is baked to perfection. Some person has to make a decision on every pizza as to its serve-ability. People make mistakes, some pizzas can be over baked some can be under baked. Consistency can be elusive when the judgement of a human is required.
The air impingement type conveyor pizzas bake the product the same every time no over baked no under baked pizzas.
George Mills
George, brother, you’re losing me here. The large chains buy new equipment when they open a store. They hire anyone that can show up for work occasionally. They hire dumb, keep them dumb, and get dumb work out of their workers. I’m NOT calling their employees stupid, but I am saying that when you’re an absentee owner with multiple stores trying to produce a duplicatable product across the country, you standardize on as fool-proof of a concept as possible.
McDonald’s and others use “clamshell” grills which cook both sides of the patty at the same time, on a timer. They have fryers that pull the fries up when the timer expires. They are worried about consistency and speed, not the absolute best product. If they had the best product, gourmet shops wouldn’t exist.
There is NO doubt that a conveyor oven will give the most duplicatable results. Smaller chains in Chicago will put in a ferris wheel oven in new shops rather than a conveyor or other method. Of course, I wouldn’t expect a conveyor oven to make a good stuffed pizza due to the complete lack of consistency in weight, thickness, and temp required to completely bake due to number and excess in toppings.
A Rotoflex sells itself as a deck oven that removes hotspots because it moves the pizza around for you. Some people here will tell you that a conveyor can produce very similar results to a deck, but a deck CAN do things a conveyor can’t, such as cook the pizza without a screen (not counting the stone-based conveyors). A conveyor can obviously do things that a deck oven can’t.
I’m interested in opinions/experiences that say that Rotoflex is either undependable, doesn’t work as advertised, or doesn’t do .
When you’re ready to tell me that Pizza Hut serves the best pizza in the world, I’ll accept their conveyors
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