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No soggy toppings, oven pre heated. It tasted great but the crust was not "crust".
Oven not hot enough. And, sadly, most ovens simply DO NOT reach pizza temps. You can put in a stone, set your oven for self-clean, shortest setting. And then start baking the pie as soon as the self-clean cycle is done.
Many Italian families have small brick ovens in their back yard -- the way that Americans have grills. You can build your own brick oven, too. It isn't difficult, but it's time consuming and can be expensive. But it's still better than buying awful pizzas from Papa John's, Domino's et. al.
Oven not hot enough. And, sadly, most ovens simply DO NOT reach pizza temps. You can put in a stone, set your oven for self-clean, shortest setting. And then start baking the pie as soon as the self-clean cycle is done.
Many Italian families have small brick ovens in their back yard -- the way that Americans have grills. You can build your own brick oven, too. It isn't difficult, but it's time consuming and can be expensive. But it's still better than buying awful pizzas from Papa John's, Domino's et. al.
The brick oven is best as you do need a heat from hell effect for good pie crust but I always consider the costs of one versus the other. Would you ever break even if building your own oven? I have friends who have large metal ovens for outdoor use and they ain't cheap. They do make good pie. Their ovens can be moved whereas the brick version can't. The restaurant down the street makes great pies in a brick oven. They do steaks in there as well which was a surprise.
I second the amount of heat BUT if the outer rim was fine and not the center, that indicates you might be fine if you fix your pie plate or whatever you're cooking it on/in. It may be dented in the center.
I usually go straight on the rack with a cooking sheet, so it has no chance of uneven distrib. Never had an issue.
Papa Murphy's pizza is basically made this way and it cooks fine in conventional ovens so I don't think brick oven is "required" per se.
The brick oven is best as you do need a heat from hell effect for good pie crust but I always consider the costs of one versus the other. Would you ever break even if building your own oven? I have friends who have large metal ovens for outdoor use and they ain't cheap. They do make good pie. Their ovens can be moved whereas the brick version can't. The restaurant down the street makes great pies in a brick oven. They do steaks in there as well which was a surprise.
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When I built my home, a friend of my husband's was remodeling a restaurant and called and asked me if I wanted the pizza oven for my back yard. It was a $25,000 Woodstone Pizza Oven. It is basically a brick dome on steel girders and weighs about 3500 pounds.
425 is not hot enough for pizza. You need as high as your oven will go, and you need to preheat your cooking pan in there as well. Also, don't go too heavy on toppings/sauce at the center. A nice, thin, even spread of ingredients is what you need.
This. A home convection oven can not replicate the crust from a commercial place, they simply can't get hot enough. You need a pizza stone with the oven temp turn up on max. Let the stone sit in there for at least 45 minutes. I've made many pizzas at home and while the crust will cook (total time about 8-10 minutes), you can not get the crispiness that business can generate with their much hotter ovens.
When I make homemade pizza I put it on a metal cooling rack (the kind you cool baked cookies on) and put that rack on a cookie sheet ... but halfway through the baking time, I slide the pizza onto the oven rack itself. I've had to experiment a LOT as I kept getting pizzas with cooked insides but burned crusts OR crusts exactly the way I want them but cheese/etc. on the inner part of the pie that wasn't completely cooked.
I HATE burned pizza crust, and many of our local mom-and-pop places always burn it. Very disappointing to spend a lot of $ on a pizza and then find when you get it home that it's too burned to taste good.
I may invest in a pizza stone too ... Threestep, please let us know which one you buy and how it works!
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