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[JAC]

Hi all,

New here but love it.  I'm having a problem with the dough sticking to my peel (steel) when trying to slide it on to the stone.  It's a Neapolitan style dough so it's a little sticky.  I've floured it and that helped a little but...
Prefer not to use cornmeal since that would ruin the texture of the soft crust.
Any helpful techniques/tips out there?

[Steve]

Have you tried dusting the peel with semolina flour?

[acciuga]

If you don't want to dust with semolina or corn meal, try a screen.  Make your pizza on that, then slide it all onto your stone or tile.  Good luck!

[DKM]

How much flour are you using?

Nobody I feed knows when I use corn meal, flour, or semolina flour so I'm not sure it makes that big of an impact.

DKM

[Randy]

I make a 50-50 mixture of both.

Randy

[canadianbacon]

I gotta vote for the cornmeal- works great !

the only thing, the bottom of my oven is really dirty now, - that corn meal gets onto the oven bottom and just burns and burns until it's black, then sits there until you clean it out.  That's the only down fall.

( I only have a 14" round pizza stone, so a lot of the cornmeal falls to the bottom when I'm putting the pizza in and taking it out.

Oh well, that's life I guess.

Mark

[Steve]

I vacuum my oven before I make pizza... get all that nasty burnt cornmeal out so it won't smoke up the place.

[JAC]

Thanks to all for the tips, keep 'em coming.  I'll give them a try and pass along results.  

Does anyone know what the poster "Giallo" is up to?  I saw posts a few months back under a Neapolitan dough subject but none very recently.  The web page mentioned still does not seem to be up and running.  Thought it could be of some help in handling this type of dough.    

[Giallo]

Hello,
I'm still here.  I've been extremely busy working on the Pizza Secrets web site.  It is set to be activated on November 11th.  Here is the link to the site in progress.  
http://www.pizzasecrets.com/index.shtml
Thanks
Joe (Giallo) Moreno
Dalla Cucina Manna

[JAC]

Giallo,

Nice to hear from you.  Any tips on how to get dough cleanly off the peel?

[Giallo]

When I use my stone, I like to use semolina flour on the wooden peel. I put a generous amount on it.  When you put your pizza on the peel, put it as far forward as you can.  Give it a few shakes to test it. It takes practice to get it to slide off just right.  You will have to sweep out your oven frequently to remove the burnt semolina flour. After a dozen pizzas or so you'll be a master pizzaiolo! Just keep making pizzas.
Joe

[Steve]

Most people make the mistake of giving the peel one large yank to get the pizza off and into the oven, sort of like the old "pull the tablecloth off the table without knocking the dinnerware off" trick!

I tried that technique when I first started out... and 50% of the time I'd end up with a huge mess in the oven. Either the dough wouldn't come off cleanly or the toppings would slide off!

Then I started "pre-yanking" the peel (for lack of a better word). After you've built your pizza on the peel, hold the peel horizontally and quickly move it front to back several times. This loosens up the dough and you should see the pizza start to slide around on the peel. Once loose, immediately put the peel to the rear of the oven and give several quick yanks on the peel to get the pie off... it should slide off very easily.

Been using this technique for the last several years and have never had a problem.  

[RoadPizza]

Most people make the mistake of giving the peel one large yank to get the pizza off and into the oven, sort of like the old "pull the tablecloth off the table without knocking the dinnerware off" trick!

I tried that technique when I first started out... and 50% of the time I'd end up with a huge mess in the oven. Either the dough wouldn't come off cleanly or the toppings would slide off!

Then I started "pre-yanking" the peel (for lack of a better word). After you've built your pizza on the peel, hold the peel horizontally and quickly move it front to back several times. This loosens up the dough and you should see the pizza start to slide around on the peel. Once loose, immediately put the peel to the rear of the oven and give several quick yanks on the peel to get the pie off... it should slide off very easily.

Been using this technique for the last several years and have never had a problem.  

A veteran  pizzaman once showed me his "trick" of getting the pizza off the peel cleanly.  When no one is looking, he'd pick up a small part of the edge and blow some air between the dough and the peel.  You can see the whole pizza lift up and do a sort of "wave".  Sure enough, it helped get that pizza off the peel much faster and easier!

. . . as far as the "pulling the tablecloth off the table" trick of placing the pizza in the oven, well, you really have to practice it a lot to get it right.

[Pierre]

My brother who worked at a pizza parlor in New york was shown that trick as well. I've also tried blowing air under the pizza to get it off the peel and it really does work. The pizza floats off the peel,but you have to keep it moving so the pizza doesn't stick again.

I now use some cornmeal on the peel and have no problem anymore.

Pierre

[RoadPizza]

Then I started "pre-yanking" the peel (for lack of a better word). After you've built your pizza on the peel, hold the peel horizontally and quickly move it front to back several times. This loosens up the dough and you should see the pizza start to slide around on the peel. Once loose, immediately put the peel to the rear of the oven and give several quick yanks on the peel to get the pie off... it should slide off very easily.

Been using this technique for the last several years and have never had a problem.  

My only trouble with "pre-yanking" (which I used to do all the time before the pizza screen came along) is that the pizza tends to become smaller during all that movement.

[Steve]

It doesn't get smaller with the "blowing air" technique?

[RoadPizza]

It doesn't get smaller with the "blowing air" technique?

Like I said, the pre-yanking would make it smaller right on the peel before I would even take it up to the oven.  

Once you blow on the pizza, it's like an avalanche - it's going to come down fast, so you have to keep moving to keep the nice, circular shape you're looking for.  I usually position the peel in an angle after blowing so I can lay the pizza down on the brick.

[canadave]

I've never had much of a problem with my dough sticking...my method:

1.  Make sure the peel is well-floured (I tried cornmeal for a while but got tired of the mess).

2.  Sometimes, if I feel like the dough might be particularly sticky, I go around the edges and lift the dough off the peel at each point, just to make sure it's separated from the peel.

2.  Put the peel all the way into the oven, just short of the far edge of the pizza stone, and at a very slight angle.  Then do a series of quick SMALL "push and pull" jerks on the peel, just to gauge how quickly the dough will move off the peel.  It's important not to *pull* the peel--PUSH and pull.  Ideally, on each push, the peel should stop right at the far edge of the stone.  If the dough is too sticky to move at all, you need to re-start, remove the peel, and put more flour under the dough.

3.  If you do your small peel pushes right, the far edge of the pizza will just begin to slide off the peel, directly onto the far part of the stone.  Once that's done (and by now, the pizza should move rather easily on your peel), use one big pull to get the rest of the pizza off the peel.

That method has almost never failed for me.

--Dave

[Randy]

I maybe able to offer some help here that will pay dividends in the flavor department as well. The key to this is having very wet dough before shaping.   In my procedure, I shaped the dough into the tight ball on a floured surface before storing it in the cooler.  The next day 2 hours before pizza time I remove the dough then divide it in half but this time instead of a floured surface I use a water wet surface with wet hands to reform the dough into two balls.  Two hours later, I heavily coat the surface and the dough ball with an equal mixture of flour, cornmeal and semolina.  This makes the dough nonstick. The heavy coating of my mixture blends in with the dough for a wonderful flavor.
Again, the key is to have wet dough to pick up the mixture.

Randy

[addicted]

Hello eveyone. Nice to see some people who have the same lamented addiction.

If using a wooden peel and your pizza starts to stick try sanding it with 80 girt sandpaper until it is silky smooth. This way you dont have to you so much flour or cornmeal on the peel.