Everyone Should Have a Pizza Stone

This photo won't win any beauty contests. But it shows off one of my favorite household products, the pizza stone. We first received a pizza stone as a wedding gift from my brother and his wife. We put it away in the closet for several years until some friends came over to teach us how to make homemade pizza. We've been using it ever since. Truth be told, we broke the original model years ago.

Used correctly, the stone gets uglier with age. It works much better after you've cooked on it quite a lot. Cooking items with a relatively high fat content darkens (or seasons it) even faster. On one of our new pizza stones we baked several batches of chocolate chip cookies. While it was admittedly better for the stone than for the cookies, it speeded up the seasoning process considerably. We weren't all that sorry about enduring the crispy cookies.

The purpose of the stone is to crisp up the crust. To call this a pizza stone is a little bit limiting. We actually bake all kinds of items on it. It's especially good for artisan breads. Place hand made loaves on the stone, pour a cup of water in a heated pan on the bottom shelf of the oven, and you're bound to pull out crispy, beautiful loaves.

We haven't found pizza stones all that easy to locate. Our local grocery store carried them for awhile; Bed Bath and Beyond is usually a sure bet.

Pizza!

Homemade pizza is probably our family's favorite meal. Our teenage kids have been known to change plans and stay home (on weekend nights, even) when they hear we are having pizza. We've tried a variety of toppings. In a later post (after we make them again), I'll include the recipes for our Chicken Feta Basil pizza and Bob's barbecue chicken pizza. I'll also try to post the recipe for the somewhat involved pizza sauce that I make from garden produce and bottle every summer.

The first time we made pizza at home was with the help of our friends Blake and Catherine, who are true experts. They introduced us to the magic of the pizza stone (which we had stored in our pantry since our wedding but had never used). We've actually gone through several stones in the meantime, and now have two that are well seasoned and well used--they are also great for baking bread, giving the finished product a lovely crust. See here, for example.

Our crust recipe has evolved somewhat over time as we've experimented with and combined different recipes. This recipe makes three large pizzas, which is usually enough to feed our crew for dinner and a rewarmed snack the next day (warm the pizza on the pizza stone for best results).

Pizza Crust
2 T. + ¼ t. instant yeast (if you aren't using instant yeast, activate the yeast in the warm water. Adding the sugar will make it come to life faster).
2 ½ cups warm water
2 ½ t. sugar
2 ½ t. salt
5 T. olive oil
6 ¼ cups flour

Mix together in stand mixer or large bowl; knead for 7-8 minutes. Let rise until double. Divide into three equal portions and roll out flat (we make them as close as possible to the size of the pizza stone). Add sauce and toppings and bake at 550 degrees for about six minutes.

We have found that order matters when it comes to toppings. Here is the preferred order for our three most frequently made pizzas. Use any basic tomato or pizza sauce for the sauce. We prefer grated mozzarella cheese, which we buy in bulk from Costco and then freeze in smaller portions.

Sausage/Mushroom Pizza: Crust – 1 ½ ladles of sauce – cheese – sausage – mushrooms – onions – cheese

Combination Pizza: Crust – 1 ½ ladles sauce – cheese – sausage - onions – mushrooms – peppers – sliced olives - pepperoni – cheese

Pepperoni Pizza: Crust – 1 ½ ladles sauce – cheese – pepperoni – cheese

Here is a photo of Bob's fine assembly work on a combination pizza just before it goes in the oven (although we do put another layer of cheese on). As you can see from the photo, we use a wooden pizza peel covered with corn meal as the base for the pizza. This allows it to slide easily onto the pizza stone, which we pre-heat for 30 minutes or so in the oven.