The brick wood fired brick oven I have is charged (pre heated) with a long hot fire, left to calm down and be evenly hot throughout, and then the ashes are cleaned out and it's ready to either roast coffee or cook pizzas. Both need high temps. Later it holds a bread baking temp for a long time. Pizza is quick and easy. Coffee....you really want to drop the heat some just as first crack is coming and some kind of ventilation is needed. That's doable. Then it's handy to be able to raise the heat a little if you want to for certain profiles. Stopping the air flow will do that when the oven is fresh charged, it just takes a great deal of practice and it's never quite a science. Good fan powered venting, and maybe gas jets for upping temps plus years of practice and you could certainly do masterfull roasts 9 times out of ten I reckon. Best way to roast a turkey, you can dry green wood overnight in it with residual heat, a freind malty barly in my oven, the pizzas are the best, sourdough bread hot of the bricks...mighty fine. Great hobby. Heavy work if it's a job. I started out roasting in my bread oven using an Androck over the fire popcorn popper, with a welding mitt I shook 1 lb. of greens inside the oven door when it was still too hot to put the 3 dozen loaves of sourdough in. Later a RK-like drum got made and a roller system to spin it on inside the oven, 7 lbs at a time. I have quite a few burn scars on my arms hands and wrists. It (hand crank roasting in the brick oven, not the scars) looked really cool and got the little roasting biz off to a good start.
With a gas grill you make the temp go up or down or stay the same, quick and easy. No waiting hours for a brick oven to warm up, no refiring throughout the day with small fires to bump the temp up to roasting level, no smoke, no ash piles, far fewer out of control roasts. Much more relaxed if it's a job,the coffee will be served in coffee shops wanting consistency, but for a once a week passionate hobby the brick oven wins hands down.
