Pizza dough sticking to the peel

[plk]

You want wood.  Metal is for removing a pizza.  You can trick the pizza back onto the wood, or pull the stone out of the oven.  A metal peel is sticky.

You can also draw a circle on a wood peel so you don't make a pie that is too big for your stone.

I did not know that. I thought that metal would be less sticky, which is why I bought a metal peel. Well, that and the weight is far less. Also, my local resturaunt supply store carries a wide variety of peels, so I'd suggest checking one of those out before ordering online. At least, you can save the shipping costs that way.

[schneich]

first of all NEVER buy the premade bullshit its always inferior to anything you make on you own. if you need a few recipes hints tricks n backgrounds i very warmly recommend peter reinharts "american pie" book which is to me the ultimate word in pizza making. before i read that book i thought my pizza is pretty good but i improved a whole lot... this book gets really down into the dough

since i also used to do a very wet dough iam quite generous with the semolina flour, and use a wooden peel (besides a bakingstone)

i also use mainly sicilian flours which taste a great deal better than the normal stuff

cheers

t.

Edited January 31, 2005 by schneich (log)

[dano1]

build on the bench, slip peel under to transfer to oven. Use a metal peel dusted with flour. Make sure bench is dusted also. as said, don't force it if it hangs....relax and try again wiping peel clean. I've done a few in my time.

[Daniel]

I usually shake the peel as i'm building my pizza, just to make sure it hasn't begun to stick.  If an area starts to glue down, a long spatula will neatly get it back up- shake, and get it into the oven as soon as possible! 

(I hope you have a self-cleaning oven!)

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Speaking of self cleaning ovens.. I remember someone on this board mentioning that their friend broke the lock on their self cleaning oven. Can anyone walk me though this process.

Edited February 1, 2005 by Daniel (log)

[phaelon56]

If I make dough that's on the really moist and pliable side when it's fresh and then freeze some... when I use the rest of that thawed batch it often has the same problem. If I use it when it's still cold and less pliable I seem to avoid the issue.

[mroybal]

I run a pizzeria and we build our pies in a peel that has been lightly dusted with semolina, our dough is used ideally at room temp since we hand roll it ( no rolling pin, it prevents a nice bubbly crust. The pie is built fast and not loaded up with sauce. Before throwing it into the oven we give it a test shake to make sure it does not stick. If it does we lift up an edge toss some more semolina on the peel and most of the time the problem is solved. Most often the problem is either not enough semolina, to much sauce, or the pixxa took to long to build.

[kermie]

the pizza stone i have has handles and i can take it out when its hot, put it on the counter, put the dough and the toppings on (very few and fast) and then put the whole thing back again. it's hot enough that it doesn't stick.

[jackal10]

Use rice flour on the peel

[ChefCrash]

Can also use parchment paper on the peel.

[pax]

I bought a cheap wooden peel at Bed, Bath and Beyond, maybe $5. It has two sides, a convex and a concave. I don't know which I am supposed to use, but I find the concave side works more easily.

After one very sad unpeeling (before the cheapo wooden peel, I was using a cookie sheet) I never ever even try to slide the thing into the oven unless I can see it sliding on the peel. If it's not sliding I lift edges and toss more cornmeal. I've wondered about the parchment sheet, but my oven gets up to 550, and with the convection feature on it's even hotter, I reckon, so I've been afraid to try. I Hoover the burnt corn meal out of the oven the next morning. It's mostly fine ash after laying on the bottom of a 550 oven for an hour, which it does because I do multiple pizzas.

I found the comment about using olive oil to damp proof the dough interesting, because I've been doing this a lot because I liked what it brought to the crust top, and maybe this is a coincidence along with the wooden peel that's made me unpeeling work so well.

Also, if you totally hose it up, go ahead and fold it up on it's own and call it a calzone. I'm sure it's delicious no matter what it looks like. If you need help disposing of the test cases, just sign me

Pizza~Calzone Freak

[pstock]

I'd suggest you either work faster building your pizza or get a new peel setup. I've never heard of a splatter screen with parchment paper.

My best DIY peels are:

a) a used pizza delivery box with the top removed and one edge cut out. (so a three sided open top pizza box.)

b) a piece of thin plywood, like an eighth of an inch thick.

good luck.

So, ever since my blog, I've learned how to make pizza from scratch using a pizza stone etc.  I've managed to do this successfully everytime since then until tonight.

Normally, I make the dough in my bread maker, roll it out, wrap my splatter screen with parchment paper and build my pizza on that, and then slide it onto the stone that has been preheating in the oven. 

Works great.  Until tonight.  Today I bought pre made dough from the bakery around the corner. 

Rolled the dough out on a floured surface.  Wrapped my splatter screen in parchment paper and sprinkled it with cornmeal.  Build the pizza, and went to slide it onto the stone. 

Disaster.  It stuck to the parchment paper.  By the time I got it off my "peel" and onto the stone, it was a misshapen, mass of sauce, dough and toppings, looking raher lopsided, while half of the stuff ended up on the oven floor.

I have no clue why it stuck.  It never has before.  The only variable in this time as opposed to the last 4 times I've done this is that I didn't make my own dough.  Oh and also, just because that's the kind of day I've been having.  Which may mean the gods were just annoyed with me over all and decided to curse my pizza.

So now I'm wondering if one of those pizza trays with the holes in them, would work on a pizza stone?  I could build a nice little pizza in the tray, stick it on the stone and not have to worry about tranferring from peel to stone. 

I suppose though, that I should really figure out why it stuck in the first place.

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Edited July 28, 2008 by pstock (log)

[jsmeeker]

My only peel is metal. It works well most of the time, I too do plenty of test shakes as I build the pizza, picking up the edges and tossing more flour or semolina underneath if it sticks. But I am thinking. a wood peel would be better for the unccoked pizza, saving the metal peel for removing the baked pizza off the stone.

I will add that I have used parchment paper under the dough before, then slid the peel under the parchment. I would trim off as much excess paper before sliding it into the oven and onto the stone. In a really hot oven, the exposed edges of the paper would char. But that's it. The paper that was actually touching dough was OK. I didn't see any adveres effects. This is the method I used when making a very thin crust pizza. I.e. rolled out very flat and thin as opposed to hand tossed dough that yields the thicker edge.

[OliverB]

So, I love making pizza from scratch. I have a wooden pizza peel. And no matter how much flower and/or corn meal I put on there, the pizza will inevitably stick to the peel and not come off easily! Certainly not as easy as any single video I've ever seen of that being done might suggest. That results in a mess in the oven or now my Big Green Egg.

I noticed my peel is not as smooth as my wooden cutting boards, so I'm gonna sand it down and oil it with cutting board mineral oil, but are there maybe other tricks to this? Would a metal peel be better? I've seen those for wood pizza ovens and be happy to buy one if it makes life and pizza easier.

I do like my crust thin, so there's not much substance to it. Should I pre-bake the crust? I guess I could just flip the peel over and drop it on the stone. But that's one more step and should not be necessary.

Thanks!

[ray goud]

The only times I have had trouble sliding a pizza from my wooden peel was when I accidentally caused a hole to from in the crust, thus allowing some topping to ooze through and soften/gummify the crust, causing it to stick to the peel. Besides having cornmeal on the peel, the crust should also be fully cooked on the bottom.

Oiling your peel after sanding can paradoxically make the situation worse if you don't remove ALL the excess oil and allow a few days for the remaining oil on the wood to "dry".

Ray

[OliverB]

so you do bake the crust first for a little? I've done that before and of course it slides off then like nothing, but is that really a requirement so to say? Should it not just slide off raw? Seems any cooking show has it on there fresh, of course they might just not show that part.

Maybe I'll leave the oil off for now but I think sanding it nice and smooth might help? Of course, might just as well make it worse.

I did not have any topping leak on the peel and I had a good hand full of corn meal on there, the dough was well flowered. Still stuck and a friend who came by yesterday reported the same problem.

[ChefCrash]

It's easy, the secret is to periodically (~every 30 seconds or so), shake the peel/pizza loose, as you assemble the topping.

If for any reason it doesn't shake loose, place the tip of a drinking straw under the pizza edge and blow to loosen the dough from the peel and shake again.

[John Rosevear]

Lay out the crust on baking parchment. Works beautifully on a pizza stone or oven rack, as you prefer, and makes moving the pizza on and off the peel extremely simple.

[Chris Amirault]

Great tips. I'll also add that using lots more corn meal than a dusting helps, as does working quickly once the dough is on the peel. If you do use corn meal, be sure to brush it off between pies, or else the pie cooks on the insulating pile of corn meal instead of the stone.

[Lisa Shock]

I tend to make thick crust pizzas with a lot of toppings, so I use a pizza screen. I learned to do it this way back in high school when I worked at a pizza place. I build the pizza on the screen. I do spray the screen occasionally with non-stick spray, but maybe once a year or so following an intense cleanup where cheese stuck to it.

[mkayahara]

The other question is the hydration level of your dough. I've found that a wetter dough tends to stick more than a slightly drier one. Beyond that, what everyone else says: lots of cornmeal (not flour), work quickly, shake occasionally as you go, especially on your way to the oven.

[Lisa Shock]

Good point, part of the reason why I use a screen is the fact that I prefer dough with higher hydration levels. I like the bubbly crust.

[Fat Guy]

Oliver, what dough recipe are you using?

[dougal]

Personally, I use parchment with a little coarse semolina above and below.

But I've heard about this american thing, which is a kinda tiny version of a commercial oven loading conveyor.

The "super peel" http://www.breadtopia.com/super-peel-in-action/

Anyone been hands on with one?

[Marlene]

Yep. It's pretty slick. Great for bread too.

[Steve Gomes]

I was having the same problem until I went to the pizza making forum.

http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php

It sounds like your dough is tooo wet or you are putting too much topping on the pie. These guys told me to sift the flour. Go over there and check out tum Lehmanns ny style pizza. you will have fun.