You might be thinking of Solo Stoves. They have the "Bonfire", which is a "smokeless" fire pit, and also the "Campfire", which actually is fairly small. It's about the size of an old metal coffee can.
I own the Campfire version. It's pretty good for cooking, because it burns for a long time on very little wood. I generally start it with some broken up branches and then keep it burning with smaller sticks. It also works with pellets, but you need to put some firestarter on the pellets or some alcohol soaked cotton balls, or it will smolder rather than get burning well. In addition to wood and pellets, they sell an alcohol burner for it, which allows you to have a "Campfire" by burning denatured alcohol. The alcohol burner in the solo stove is in one of Bob's recent videos.
As far as cons, using pots or pans on top of any wood burner will turn them black with soot. You can cover the bottoms with heavy duty aluminum foil to prevent this. People also pretreat the bottoms with dish soap. That doesn't prevent the soot, but allows it to wash off easier.
The Bonfire version is big enough to replace a fire ring for a group of people. I don't have that one, and it's rather expensive (about $300). I've watched several videos on it and considered it, but since it's expensive and large, I probably won't get it.
