Bought a pizza from another store. 11:00 AM Saturday. Identical to those from Home Made Pizza.
It was THIN, BUT FROZEN. Let thaw in the refrigerator. Started to cook around 5:30 PM.
Cook on a Weber Charcoal Grill including a pizza stone. THEN HELL BEGAN !!!!!!!!!!
Pizza was on parchment paper. I added a few ingredients. I was unable to slide the pizza off the parchment paper onto the stone without destroying it. Eventually got it on the stone, uneven. After 2-3 minutes, parchment paper stuck to the pizza. A DISASTER !!!!!!!!!!
I've had the same problem with Fresh, Unfrozen pizza from Home Made Pizza.

Looking for your usual expert advice.

Thanks,

Wally Wade

Why don't you put it on something else solid that the pizza will slide off easily? Frozen and fresh store-bought pizzas aren't usually sticky and difficult to handle, so I'd just put it on a cutting board or even just keep it on the cardboard it usually comes with and just slide it off that. It's not really necessary to use parchment paper.

I am surprised at the parchment paper sticking to the pizza, though. I've used parchment on homemade pizza and cooked it on the floor of the oven (which is HOT), and it's never stuck, so I'm curious as to why that happened.

walter wade wrote:Bought a pizza from another store. 11:00 AM Saturday. Identical to those from Home Made Pizza.
It was THIN, BUT FROZEN. Let thaw in the refrigerator. Started to cook around 5:30 PM.
Cook on a Weber Charcoal Grill including a pizza stone. THEN HELL BEGAN !!!!!!!!!!
Pizza was on parchment paper. I added a few ingredients. I was unable to slide the pizza off the parchment paper onto the stone without destroying it. Eventually got it on the stone, uneven. After 2-3 minutes, parchment paper stuck to the pizza. A DISASTER !!!!!!!!!!
I've had the same problem with Fresh, Unfrozen pizza from Home Made Pizza.

Looking for your usual expert advice.

Thanks,

Wally Wade

How long did you preheat the pizza stone. If the stone is too cold, the pizza may stick.
The bottom of the pizza may be wet after defrosting it, causing it to stick to the parchment. You need to apply something to get it to slide, like flour/cornmeal/semolina.

Must have been wet between parchment & pizza dough.

Thanks,

Wally Wade

Hi,

I was just reading Toby Sonneman's blog, who will be a guest speaker in August on lemons for Culinary Historians. She wrote about a pizza I had never considered, though people may want to try: lemon pizza with smoked mozzarella. A key step was soaking the slices of lemon for 15 minutes before baking.

Regards,

two pies cooked on the BGE last night

Fresh sweet corn with roasted poblano peppers and pepper jack cheese
dome temp 800˚stone temp 725˚baked for 3 min. (a little too much char on the bottom)


Squash blossom with fresh herbs and goat cheese (some mozz too) red sauce was a can of SM tomatoes drained and hand crushed.
cooked at 650˚ dome and 550˚stone for 7 min.

Dough was caputo's 1 lb ball split (notice the flat edge on both pies...) both pies were roughly 10" across.

I'm thinking about trying pizza in the WSM. All the grill stones I see are too big (I have an 18" smokey mountain) - though I'm not at all certain I'm ready to plunk down $50 for another kitchen gadget anyway. I have a stone in my oven, but it's square.

I was thinking about using one of those metal cross-hatch things to put it on, or just a pizza pan of the right size, and using the water pan ( with no water in it ) to make the heat indirect. Would that work? I don't want to have to flip the dough and then top it, but to make like an oven...

My latest pizza oven. This is living up near Rothbury Michigan. On it's first run temps were well above 900 degrees and pizzas were coming out in under 2 minutes.

drshoebocks wrote:My latest pizza oven. This is living up near Rothbury Michigan. On it's first run temps were well above 900 degrees and pizzas were coming out in under 2 minutes.

Wow, drshoebucks, that looks cool. I mean--hot.

drshoebocks wrote:My latest pizza oven. This is living up near Rothbury Michigan. On it's first run temps were well above 900 degrees and pizzas were coming out in under 2 minutes.

That's the best thing I've seen in a long time!
Can you give us an idea of how it was constructed?

Here's a couple from yesterday-
Margherita and mozz and herbed ricotta finished with basil pesto.

Can you give us an idea of how it was constructed?

Certainly
This is what is often called a cobb oven. They are also referred to as Quebec ovens. This one was made with two layers. The inner layer, which is about 3 inches thick, is a mix of clay and sand. The second, outer layer, is another 3-4 inches and is a mix of clay, sand and straw.

Construction is pretty simple and we completed this one in two days. The basic process involves creating a base for the oven to sit on. You then layout fire bricks on a bed of sand. A sand mold is created on which you then construct the clay oven. The easiest way to do the thermal layers is to mix the clay/sand and then form them into potatoes. These are then placed around the mold as you work your way up. After construction is complete you simply cut a door and pull out the sand mold. For this oven it was given two weeks to cure before this initial firing.

Here is a great book on the subject
http://www.amazon.com/Build-Your-Own-Earth-Oven/dp/096798467X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1373996057&sr=8-1&keywords=earth+oven

Don't hesitate to get in touch with me if you want more information.

Here is my first attempt at making pizza (used a Cooks Illustrated thin crust recipe)

Caramelized Onion and Garlic Mushroom Pizza

What did you do to get the crust so brown??

Also, how was the bottom?? Burnt?

Thanks,

Wally Wade

walter wade wrote:Must have been wet between parchment & pizza dough.

Thanks,

Wally Wade

Did you put it on parchment and try to remove the parchment before or after cooking? It is supposed to cook on the parchment and THEN be removed, as I understand it.

walter wade wrote:What did you do to get the crust so brown??

Also, how was the bottom?? Burnt?

Thanks,

Wally Wade

This was my first ever attempt at making pizza, so I probably did everything wrong, but I didn't use any parchment. Just a little bit of cornmeal on the peel and a pizza stone.

This was baked in my oven set at 500 degrees. I preheated the pizza stone for an hour positioned around 5 - 6" from the top of the oven instead of at the bottom. That let the toppings and the top of the crust cook at approx the same rate as the bottom of the crust. The bottom didn't burn at all. There were a few nice dark spots, but that's about it. I should have taken a picture...rookie mistake. I'm making another pizza tomorrow night using the rest of the dough. I'll be sure to get a upskirt shot.

I have a convection setting on my oven and often run it, or turn it on part way through the bake and get a similarly nicely browned top. The bottom is never burnt. Also aids in getting a nice puffy rim to the pie, if that's what you're looking for.

I preheated the pizza stone for an hour

This is not at all a criticism of your methods, Steve, but I've seen mentions of long preheating times before, and I have to say I don't understand why they're necessary. I keep meaning to ask an old classmate who is a mechanical engineer. It seems to me that if both the pizza stone and the interior of the oven start at room temperature and you preheat the oven to some temperature--say, 500--then, when the oven gets to 500, the temperature of the pizza stone is 500 too. Pizza stones are generally thin and when their surfaces are, say, 500 degrees, their interiors probably are 500 too. I see no reason to continue preheating beyond that point and putting off starting to cook. It seems like a waste to me. Can anyone explain the rationale for an hour of preheating?

Katie wrote:

I preheated the pizza stone for an hour

This is not at all a criticism of your methods, Steve, but I've seen mentions of long preheating times before, and I have to say I don't understand why they're necessary. I keep meaning to ask an old classmate who is a mechanical engineer. It seems to me that if both the pizza stone and the interior of the oven start at room temperature and you preheat the oven to some temperature--say, 500--then, when the oven gets to 500, the temperature of the pizza stone is 500 too. Pizza stones are generally thin and when their surfaces are, say, 500 degrees, their interiors probably are 500 too. I see no reason to continue preheating beyond that point and putting off starting to cook. It seems like a waste to me. Can anyone explain the rationale for an hour of preheating?

A thicker stone, like many of us have, takes a while to get up to temperature. That stone will be hotter after the oven's been on for an hour than it will be if the oven's been on for 15 minutes. Try it. You'll see.

=R=

For anyone interested, this was a Kickstarter project that has finally gone into production. A tabletop wood-burning pizza oven for about $400 shipped:

http://uuni.net/

They just went on sale this week and looks like the first batch is sold out.

ronnie_suburban wrote:

Katie wrote:

I preheated the pizza stone for an hour

This is not at all a criticism of your methods, Steve, but I've seen mentions of long preheating times before, and I have to say I don't understand why they're necessary. I keep meaning to ask an old classmate who is a mechanical engineer. It seems to me that if both the pizza stone and the interior of the oven start at room temperature and you preheat the oven to some temperature--say, 500--then, when the oven gets to 500, the temperature of the pizza stone is 500 too. Pizza stones are generally thin and when their surfaces are, say, 500 degrees, their interiors probably are 500 too. I see no reason to continue preheating beyond that point and putting off starting to cook. It seems like a waste to me. Can anyone explain the rationale for an hour of preheating?

A thicker stone, like many of us have, takes a while to get up to temperature. That stone will be hotter after the oven's been on for an hour than it will be if the oven's been on for 15 minutes. Try it. You'll see.

=R=

I have a thicker pizza stone and an infrared thermometer (for those who don't know, this is a device you point at an object and it reads the surface temp from a distance). I've tested it and the stone definitely heats up slower than the oven temp implies. 45 minutes to an hour preheat is a good rule of thumb.

For wood fired ovens what type of wood do you use and where do you get it in Chicagoland?. I have been using hickory from Chicago firewood Company
1300 North Halsted Street
Chicago, IL 60642-2632
chicago-firewood.com

I did get wood once from
Get Fresh Produce, Inc
1441 Brewster Creek Blvd
Bartlett, IL 60103

They do not sell to the public, you need a sales tax license.

I was thinking of a stone more like a quarter to a half an inch thick. I don't see any advantage to using a thicker stone, and I see the long heating time as a disadvantage.

Katie wrote:I was thinking of a stone more like a quarter to a half an inch thick. I don't see any advantage to using a thicker stone, and I see the long heating time as a disadvantage.

Even thinner stones take longer than you probably realize to reach temperature. And the thinner they are, the faster they cool off, which is why it's ideal to use a thicker one if you're making several pizzas in succession. Doing so helps mitigate the temperature loss from repeatedly opening and closing the oven.

=R=

I have a thicker stone than that. It's what I got so it's what I use

Round two of pizza making went well. Letting the rest of the dough ferment in the fridge for an extra two days really made for a tender, yet crisp crust. Still a little more puffy/beady than what I was hoping for, but very good flavor nonetheless. I used up the remainder of my caramelized onions and added some thick cut bacon, just because I could.

Caramelized Onion and Bacon Pizza

If the above premise were correct, then when one turns the oven off, the stone would cool off as quickly as the oven. Clearly not the case.

For wood fired ovens what type of wood do you use and where do you get it in Chicagoland?. I have been using hickory from Chicago firewood Company

I use A1 firewood down in Pilsen. They used to be on Cermak but I think they may have recently moved. When making Pizza I prefer to use oak. It burns long and hot.

JeffB wrote:If the above premise were correct, then when one turns the oven off, the stone would cool off as quickly as the oven. Clearly not the case.

No, that's not true. Obviously, a pizza stone, even a thin one, heats up and cools down more slowly than the air in an oven. The issue is how much longer--beyond the time that an empty oven would take to come up to the target temperature X--would it take for the surface of a pizza stone in the oven to come up to temperature X. Or conversely, how much longer would it take to cool down.

The thicker a pizza stone is, the greater its thermal mass is, and the longer it takes to heat up and cool down. My comments above were made with thin pizza stones in mind. As someone else said, that's what I've got, so that's what I use. Thin stones don't need an hour to preheat. I can believe that thicker ones do. This has been extensively discussed on pizzamaking.com and in various breadmaking forums, so no need (for me, that is) to rehash it here.

In the restaurant Brick Ovens, eg, Spacca Napoli, what is their cooking oven temperature???

Anybody know for sure?? I thought maybe 800-900 degrees??
Whole Foods is only 560 or so, for their brick oven.

Wally Wade