Oven temps and browned cheese

[Jack]

I've been fooling around with oven temperatures (25°F increments) because my cheese has been browning before my crust.  Typically, I've been running the oven at 475°F, using a 63% near Lehman dough, parm & part skim Mozz, on a 19 inch fibrament stone (bottom rack).  Last night, in a moment of frustration, I set the temp to 550°F, waited an hour and slid a pie in.  I was watching it closely, as I was concerned about burning the crust. 

Big Surprise!! I pulled that 17 inch pie out, when the outer crust was strating to brown and found a perfectly browned crust and UNbrowned cheese at the same time.  Actually, while eating it, I discovered that the rim could have used another 30 seconds or so, but the cheese was not going to start browning any time soon.

Changing hydration didn't make nearly the difference another 75°F did to affect the way that pie cooked up.

Moral  - Don't hesistate to crank that oven up.

Jack

BTW - it was a Broccoli and Fettuccini pizza because I was cleaning up the leftovers from the night before.  Crispy pasta on a pizza rocks!

[pizza-anytime]

hello there. i cook my pizza at 475 f tht has been preheated for abt 45-50 min and the result is similar to wht u described as the cheese browing up before the crust. i have never cranked up my oven temp more then tht but reading ur post was encouraging and i am thinking of trying it out over the weekend. can u plz tell me for how long did u preheat ur oven at 550 f. thanx.

[Jack]

I let the oven run for a full hour before cooking, but my stone is a 19 inch diameter, 3/4 inch thick Fibrament.  It has a lot of mass to get up to temperature.  Your warm up time may be different, probabaly no longer than mine, depending on the stone you use.

jack

[KingPinAlley]

I only use Grande 50/50 (50% 100%low moisture whole milk/50% provolone)

I par bake my crusts on a pan daily and shelve them, dress the par baked crust and cook the pizza on a pan for 8 minutes and the off the pan directly on the stone for 2 minutes, all in stone lined baker's pride ovens at 450 deg.

  The result is a thin, crispy, crust NY style pizza that's the talk of my central TX town!!...BUT...the GRANDE cheese won't brown.  If you overcook a pizza, or even leave it in for 15 minutes.....it still doesn't brown.  They tell me that's the test for quality cheese (it's at 3 bucks a pound now).

Maybe your cheese is a high quality and it won't brown!!  The grande just kinda milks up if overcooked and then comes back together when it cools.  Now don't get me wrong, I never tried to cook just the cheese for say 20 minutes and make it brown, but I do know that at 450 deg for 15 min., it doesn't.

Grande sends you all kinds of table hats, wall art, window stickers, box stickers, etc. that all say stuff like "the difference in a pizzeria and a pizza chain is the cheese" etc.  and we just tell everyone that the quality cheese doesn't brown and they love it!!  If you never tried Grande you should, it is an awsome tasting cheese!!

Hope this helps!!

[nepa-pizza-snob]

I noticed that a crust with a hydration percentage > 60% doesn't brown deeply enough before
the top is done irregardless of oven temp. In my oven using a lean lehman style dough 60% Hyd
is the max even at 550 with an hour preheat. Try tuning down from 63 to 60 and see what happens.

Its my belief that until you can get real hot 900+ 60% is the limit. Maybe 61-62 but for me thats really pushing it. I hope to gain access to a wood fired oven someday to prove this.