New Pizza Steel

[RonW.]

New Pizza Steel
PL. 3/8"x15"x20" being cured on a gasser that gets HOT. I had the plate sand blasted down to white metal and had one side buffed smooth. Coated both sides with mineral oil and cranked up the heat.
Pit thermometer pegged out at 650/700 degrees while the internal temp was 550 degrees plus.

Thanks:

RonW.

[scott123]

Ron, the steel plate looks pretty, but I'm not sure it will give you the results you're looking for.

Steel, when used as a hearth, is a bottom browning accelerator.  Grill environments, because the heat is coming from below, tend to brown the pizza too quickly on the bottom, so, by using a conductive material for the hearth, you're only compounding the bottom/top heat ratio issue.

Instead of bolstering the bottom heat with a strong conductor, in this setting, you want to be handicapping the bottom heat with a weak conductor so that the heat coming from the top of the grill (or preferably a 2 stone scenario) can have greater proportional impact. Weak conductors are materials like firebrick splits, quarry tiles or fibrament grill stones.

In any bottom heat scenario, the goal should be to use a poor conductor for the hearth, a good emitter for the ceiling (preferably something dark) with a close proximity ceiling (no more than 3" from the hearth) that's considerably larger than the hearth so it can collect heat rising from below.

[RonW.]

What do you suggest I put on the steel, stones, quarry tiles??

On the first pie I cooked I preheated for about an hour temp was around 500/550 (cheap pit thermo). The dough was too thick for my liking, but the bottomed was dark brown before the top was done, still edible just a lil crunchy.

[RonW.]

So yesterday was attempt number 2. Been reading about Chicago thin crust thread and tried that. So based on cook 1, i pre-heated 1 hr, slide pie on, when inside for about 3 minutes (BIG mistake) pie was burnt "BLACK"....

Opened pit and let steel cool down, put pie 2 on parchment paper and tried again with total success! Lesson learned: pit too hot and dough too thin equals BLACK....

Gonna try again next week. Sorry but no pics on pie 2, every one was hungry after wasteing pie 1.


RonW.

[jak123]

Ron, I had one of these made for my oven in my kitchen for a wolf dual fuel range.(gas top, electric oven). It works great for me, i crank the oven to 550 and use the roast mode(which is a type of convection) and I make great neo pies in about 2 minutes.

[Jet_deck]

What do you suggest I put on the steel, stones, quarry tiles??

No, but you could put them under the plate....

[RonW.]

What would that do, guess it would slow down the plate temp,

What should I do , I'm not trying to cook the fastest pie, just want good quality pies....
 Thanks..
Ron

[scott123]

Ron, two things.

First, you really need an IR thermometer.  You can get one for as little as $20 shipped.

Secondly, my previous comments were based upon the premise that you'll eventually want to be baking a relatively fast NY style pizza.  If you're okay with other slower styles, you have a little more flexibility.  I don't think other styles will give you the kind of flexibility to work with steel, though.  Steel in a bottom heat scenario is a recipe for a lot of headaches. I would say that the go to stone for people that want to do longer baked pizzas on a grill is cordierite.  It's very durable, it has good conductivity (but not too high) and holds stable temps. Out of all the options, though, cordierite baking stones (Bed Bath & Beyond, Williams Sonoma, Pottery suppliers) are usually the most expensive. Quarry tiles can have issues with direct flame, but, if you put the tiles on top of the steel plate, you should be okay.

Either cordierite or quarry on steel should make your life a lot easier.  Neither will give you a fast NY bake, but if that's not what you're into, then those materials will work just fine.