First Pizza....not a true sucess...but eatable!

Ohio Ed · April 2004

Well I tried my hand at makeing a pizza that was supposed to look like QBabe's. I followed Mr Hyde's receipy for the dough but I think it was a little too sticky, needed more flour or less liquid. I let it proof in the frig for 6 hrs. Then came the fun. I bought a new peel and new screen and that takes some getting used to. First I learned that you have to be generous with the corn meal all over the peel...not just under the pie. I built the pie on the peel thinking this would make it easy to slide it onto the screen.When I went to slide the pie off the peel and on to the screen I discovered the dough will stick to bare wood!! By the time I got the pie off the peel it was hard to tell what shape it was!. I spred it back out the best I could but it still looked square...not a problem, afterall Pizza Hut offers square ones!
I had no problem getting the BGE up to 550 deg and fairly stable 550-570. I've got a Large Egg and the set up was legs down plate setter with the 14" pizza stone on top. I forgot to put corn meal on the pizza stone before putting the screen on and some of the pie stuck to the stone.
Afer about 6 minutes I rotated the screen( after nearly burning my fingers thru the leather gloves I used) and gave it another 4 minutes. The toppings were done but the crust was't quite as brown sa I thought it would get. Maybe it takes longer on the large Egg?
The wife and I enjoyed eating this little adventure, and I'm more determined than ever to get it right...will try again this week end.
Thanks for all your help on this forum and for QBabe, I hold up your pizza pictures as my goal !

QBabe · April 2004

Ohio Ed,[p]Glad you had fun and are going to give it another try...! A couple hints...Larry always builds his pie directly on the screen (after it's been generously sprayed with Pam). He's never had to use corn meal to keep it from sticking, but then again, he makes it a pretty quick time from putting the dough on the screen, adding the toppings and into the cooker. If the cooker's not ready, don't build the pie, 'cause the bottom softens with all those liquidy things and kind of sinks into the mesh (which is what is sounds like happened to you, especially if you had the pie stick to the stone too, through the mesh).[p]The only thing he uses the peel for is to rotate the pizza if there's a hot spot (screen and pizza together) or retrieve the pizza when it's time to remove it from the screen to 1) take it off the cooker or 2) brown the bottom longer if need be...[p]Larry, if I've missed anything, chime on in....(I'll be home soon).[p]Tonia
:~)

Mr. Hyde · April 2004

Ohio Ed,[p]A couple of thoughts:[p]The dough should be fairly sticky. I usually generously flour the counter, the rolling pin, and my hands. [p]As Tonia said, I build the pie on the screen. There are a couple of advantages: You don't need cornmeal, the screen acts as a form so that your pizza ends up round (this doesn't show up in our pictures, because our screen is 16" and our pizza stone is only 14", so I can't build the pizza out to the edge, but that is how it should work), and the screen provides a kind of insulator from the heat of the stone, so the bottom doesn't burn. You can always brown the bottom at the end if it is under done. Also the screen should be seasoned before use, much like cast iron.[p]I use a metal peel. I don't know that a wood one would get between the pizza and the screen, or the screen and the stone...but I have never tried it so I am not sure. I actually did not have a peel for the first several pizzas that I made on the egg, but as you said, the leather gloves get hot quickly at 550 degrees (although I was amazed, we used them to take the hot coal out of the eggs at the last Florida Fest, and the gloves survived!)[p]Keep trying, they just get better![p]Larry

Shelby · April 2004

Ohio Ed,
It took me several tries before I had what I'd consider a 'successful' pizza cook. In the meantime, I kept eating the 'failures' which, while they might not have won prizes for looks, still tasted pretty good.[p]As for your set up...it's perfect. The dough should cook fairly quickly if the plate setter and pizza stone are allowed to come up to temperature while the egg is heating up. Typically, you'll want to let them heat up for about 20 minutes. If you didn't, that may be why your crust didn't brown as fast as you would've thought. Keep at it!

Ohio Ed · April 2004

Thanks to all for your suggestions, it was fun eating the "failures". I especially like making the pie on the seasoned screen just before putting it on the stone.
Will let you know how the next ones turn out.
Ed

First Pizza....not a true sucess...but eatable!

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