Do You Need to Use a Pizza Stone to Cook Pizza Dough Properly?

If you’re running a restaurant that serves New York style pizza dough, or gluten free pizza crust, you’re probably cooking it one of three ways: in a pizza oven, on a pizza stone, or on a baking sheet. If you’re one of the ones still using a baking sheet, you might be wondering if you should make the move to a pizza stone. And if you don’t have a pizza oven, you should. 

 

Pizza dough when cooked properly, especially in New York or Italian style, should be very crispy on the outside and even charred and blackened in some areas. Inside however it should be soft, chewy, and delicious. This texture is easily attained in pizza ovens that reach temperatures of 900 degrees Fahrenheit or over, but it can be hard to replicate that environment in a conventional or convection oven. It’s because of this that a pizza stone is required if you want to make dough with this kind of texture. 

 

A pizza stone can easily give you that crust because of the actual stone it’s made of. Preheat the stone in the oven before putting any crust on it, and when you take it out to slide that fresh pizza on, that stone traps in the heat and distributes even more heat to the dough during the cooking process. This is why stones are so important when you don’t have a pizza oven. 

 

Remember that if you are going to be using a pizza stone to cook your pizza, always oil it before placing any dough on it; otherwise any dough you place on it will only stick to the stone.