Pizzas

Dawgtired

Third cook with my new egg tonight. First cook, steak(TRex) was out of this world. Second cook was JJ's Parmesean Cornish Hens, also fantastic. Third cook tonight were homemade pizzas, individual sized. I wouldn't say it was a disaster by any means but certainly wasn't a "Gee, Dad, you're the greatest" moment either. I stabilized the egg at about 575, put the stone on for about 15-20 minutes. These were fairly small pizzas, two on a 16" stone. I threw some cornmeal on the stone and I cooked them for about 8 minutes and the bottoms burned. OK, next two were cooked at 5 minutes without spreading the cornmeal on the stone. The bottoms were still burned a little and the dough was a little moist in spots. This was a new stone but I doubt this had anything to do with it. Maybe the stone got too hot, but how can you tell until after the fact that it's too hot?
Thanks in advance for any help.
Steve

nikkig

Dawgtired,
It sounds like your stone was definately too hot. Did you also use a plate setter? With a plate setter, you have a thicker mass, and your stone would be more stable temp wise. [p]~nikki

The Naked Whiz

Dawgtired,
I told you about the plate setter! :-) You can use two pizza stones instead of one and achieve the same thing. Or you could use some firebrick splits. If you used whole firebricks, it probably will take longer to preheat.[p]TNW

Shelby

Dawgtired,
Pizza can be one of the tougher things to learn but well worth the efforts.[p]When doing pizza, I always start the fire. Once it's started, I add the plate setter on top of the grill(this sorta cleans the grill at the same time) and a pizza stone and let that come up to temp with the egg. In about 30 mins, everything is ready. I have found when doing a second pizza close behind the first that it takes longer. But I figured out that the temp of the pizza stone had dropped, thus taking longer.[p]Keep trying, once you master this the kids will be mighty impressed.

eggaholic

Dawgtired,
As mentioned below it sounds like your stone was too hot.I just raise my stone up with bricks under it in three spots near the edge, to get it well out of the direct heat coming off the coals.I lift it about 6" but with no mass under the stone it heats quickly and recovers temperature so fast that the 10th pizza cooks as excellently as the first. We can't bring ourselves to order pizza anymore,it
just wouldn't be the same.
Happy Egging,
Brian

Unknown

nikkig,

Unknown

nikkig,
I did several pizzas last weekend and suffered similar problems with burned crust. I was using a plate setter with a pizza stone. The first pizza, cooked at 500 deg for ten minutes was almost perfect. But while I was preparing the second pizza, the egg was up over 600 degrees and was difficult to get the temperature down. The crust was blackened on one side. For the most part my neighbors and family were impressed - homemade crust, sauce and the egg made for an adventure. We'll keep working. I didn't know if you had any suggestions for controlling temp between pizzas.

The Naked Whiz

dehuslo,
You say it was blackened on one side. How close to the edge of the stone was the blackened part? If you allow the crust to get close the edge, it will burn even if the stone is not too hot. I use a 16 inch stone to cook 14 inch pies and I make sure that the pie is as close to centered as I can get it. If the crust is even with the edge, it will burn.[p]TNW