When good stones go bad...

[spookygrinder]

After about 30-40 pies on my pizza stone I'm starting to get unpleasantly black bottoms on my pizzas.  My stone is located on the bottom of my oven, which didn't used to be a problem.  I'm wondering if I made a mistake with too much olive oil in a batch of dough, which is causing this problem.  I took the stone out and sanded it.  No help whatsoever.  Do stones go bad, do I just need to raise mine farther from the heat source, or should I lower the tiles on the rack above so that top and bottom finish at the same time?

[Pete-zza]

spookygrinder,

Did you make any changes to the dough after the 30-40 pizzas when the problem first arose, as by adding sugar or honey to the dough, or was the oil the only change?  How much oil and flour are you using? Did you change the bake temperature or time after the 30-40 pizzas?

Are you using a gas oven and placing the stone on the floor of the oven? Are you using any cornmeal on your peel and, if so, are you cleaning your stone after each use to get rid of the burnt cornmeal?

If the stone is used properly, even if it looks grungy from baked-in fats, it shouldn't go bad.

Peter

[2stone]

After about 30-40 pies on my pizza stone I'm starting to get unpleasantly black bottoms on my pizzas.  My stone is located on the bottom of my oven, which didn't used to be a problem.  I'm wondering if I made a mistake with too much olive oil in a batch of dough, which is causing this problem.  I took the stone out and sanded it.  No help whatsoever.  Do stones go bad, do I just need to raise mine farther from the heat source, or should I lower the tiles on the rack above so that top and bottom finish at the same time?

spookygrinder

I have just been testing stones and various shaped steel disks under them
You can change the behavior of the stone by what it sits on. for instance
when you create a closed airspace under the stone, you can see the difference
I don't bake in the oven but have wondered what would happen if you put a large
stainless steel mixing bowl in and used your stone as a lid. that way you create  a secondary
static air chamber under the stone. you could also experiment with diffrent fill material in the mixing bowl
under the stone such as sand or stones  etc. (don't fill it full) the way I saw peet-zza had don only you would not be baking directly on them. You could also try a round baking pan with slightly smaller diameter than the stone with a  1/2 inch lip. Fill it with sand and place your stone directly on the sand. This would be a cheap way to thicken a thinner stone and give it some thermal mass. You can get high quality sand cheap at your homesenter

willard

[scott r]

Spookygrinder, some trips through the cleaning cycle can really do wonders for a soaked up stain on your pizza stone. You should wait a while before you do this if the stain was created by lots of moisture or the stone has been washed in the past few days.  Good luck!

[Jack]

Spookygrinder, some trips through the cleaning cycle can really do wonders for a soaked up stain on your pizza stone. You should wait a while before you do this if the stain was created by lots of moisture or the stone has been washed in the past few days.  Good luck!

I did this after a broken pie left a large amount of burnt cheese, olive oil and other pizza ingredients burned onto my stone.  I brought it up to 550°F slowly to allow excess moisture out, then turned on a cleaning cycle.  My Fibrament looked brand new again.

Jack

[spookygrinder]

Did you make any changes to the dough after the 30-40 pizzas when the problem first arose, as by adding sugar or honey to the dough, or was the oil the only change?  How much oil and flour are you using? Did you change the bake temperature or time after the 30-40 pizzas?

Are you using a gas oven and placing the stone on the floor of the oven?

I think oil was the only change to my recipe.  Maybe a tad more sugar.  I use a gas oven with stone on the oven floor.  I've since moved it up to the lowest rack and that seems to have helped a great deal.

[Jack]

Oops, my misread.  I'm glad you have found the answer.

Jack

[celts32]

I did this after a broken pie left a large amount of burnt cheese, olive oil and other pizza ingredients burned onto my stone.  I brought it up to 550°F slowly to allow excess moisture out, then turned on a cleaning cycle.  My Fibrament looked brand new again.

Jack

Jack,
Did you put the stone directly on the bottom of the oven when you turned on the cleaning cycle?  The oven racks in my gas oven are not supposed to go through the cleaning cycle.  I would like to clean my stone but I am afraid to break it.

[petef]

.... I use a gas oven with stone on the oven floor.  I've since moved it up to the lowest rack and that seems to have helped a great deal.

See my post and pic at the link below to see how I solved a similar problem.

http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,5982.new.html#2

---pete---

[Jack]

Jack,
Did you put the stone directly on the bottom of the oven when you turned on the cleaning cycle?  The oven racks in my gas oven are not supposed to go through the cleaning cycle.  I would like to clean my stone but I am afraid to break it.

I put the rack through the cycle.  It is a tad hard on the chrome plate, slightly discoloring it, but racks are not expensive in the hardware store.  In retrospect, I wish I had bought a cheap replacement rack to use during the cleaning cycle, keeping my original racks safe and cool.

To avoid shocking the stone, bring it up to your highest normal oven temperature and let it sit for a while; 30-60 minutes?  This will insure it is completely dry, then switch over to the clean cycle.

Jack