How do you like to cook your homemade pizza?

I have always just cooked mine in the oven. A few years back when I got a Kamado I cooked some in there. But sometimes my wife and daughter find them to be a little too smokey.

Should I look at getting one of the pizza attachments for the Kamado? Since the lids stays partially open, would that help impart less wood flavor?

Should I look at one of the counter top propane powered options like Roccbox, Ooni, Solo Stove or other?

Cast iron pan on the Kamado. Hot fire and not smokey at all

Preheat our 20 y.o. pizza stone in a 550 degree oven ("Stone" setting in our Wolf oven) for 20 minutes, use a pizza peel to slide the pie onto the stone.

Rim'd pan or a stone

I just use a steel "stone" in the oven. 550F. It works fine and is much easier (and quicker) than firing up the Egg.

I've toyed with buying a dedicated pizza oven but it's kind of hard to justify.

BGE on a stone with charcoal only. If you're getting it hot enough the time in the grill is very short.

Like Oddball, pizza stone in the oven. Our stone is 3/4” thick and takes almost an hour to bring to temp but once there, it produces restaurant quality crusts on my pies.

If looking for a dedicated oven, be aware that many are designed to cook at high temps made for Neapolitan style pizzas using Caputo flour. These pies cook in under 2 minutes at temps approaching 900 degrees. If wanting New York style, cooking temps will be in the 500-550 range.

Good luck in your search and please post back with your findings and what you settle on as there are others on the forum who cook their own pies.

For me it is a pizza stone on the bottom shelf of my oven at 500 degrees.

^^^ Yep Pizza Stone in oven preheated to 500 degrees.

I did them in my oven for years and they were good. But I find a little smoke flavor from the KJ makes them better.
I also can get the KJ hotter than the oven so they end up being a little crisper (I like the crust thin).
I use a stone, and I put it on a shelf so it sits up high in the dome. I think it stays hotter up top, and there is a little more smoke.
They are done in about 5 minutes.

quote:

Originally posted by holdem:
Should I look at getting one of the pizza attachments for the Kamado? Since the lids stays partially open, would that help impart less wood flavor?

I've got one of the pizza attachments for the KJ - I got results that were just as good without it.


When you cook yours, are you using just lump charcoal or are you adding additional wood?


Different lump charcoal can have an impact on the flavor too - I like the BGE brand personally. I am not a fan of Cowboy lump charcoal.


Also, are you getting your KJ good and hot? Depending on the crust I shoot for about 500 (600+ for thin crust) degrees when we do pizza on the KJ here.

My wife has always made her own pizza dough, but we've been using the Alton Brown recipe for "brick oven" pizza for about 15 years.

Instead of an expensive pizza stone, Brown said to go to Home Depot or Lowes & get unglazed quarry tile for about a dollar each. Six of the 8" tiles (2 rows of 3) fit in our oven, or on the Weber gas grill.

Preheat oven or grill to 500 degrees, put the pizza on the tiles, and in 4-5 minutes you have a nice "brick oven" pizza.

Preheated ceramic pizza stone in my 700-800 degree Big Green Egg. FOJO large lump hardwood charcoal.

Fantastic.

I use a 1/4" pizza steel. 550 degree gas oven. Excellent leopard spotting on the bottom of the crust, cooks a pizza in about 4 minutes. I can't get color on the top of the crust though and then have to throw it under the broiler for about a minute.

Ooni Fyra. Pellet fired.
Never tried pizza on the Big Green Egg though. Even though I do have a pizza stone for it (was given to me).

quote:

Originally posted by smschulz:
^^^ Yep Pizza Stone in oven preheated to 500 degrees.

Same here. Best my oven will do is 500.

In Pueblo we have a very strong Italian community. Most every large farm in Pueblo County is Italian owned. When its home made pizza time we stop at an Italian market called Gagliano's. Owned by that family for a little over 100 years. We buy their dough, cheese, pepperoni, and Italian sausage. The latter is the best I've ever had. Roll out the dough. Load up the toppings bake at 400 for 20 minutes. I would rather have this then any restaurant pizza I've ever bought.

Pizza steel 1/4" in your home oven. Preheat oven for an hour or so at 550 degrees.

I also have an ooni. Great fun but a bit of a pain to learn. You will make mistakes. Lots of good Youtube videos to help. I love the ooni but the pizza steel is easier.

quote:

Originally posted by oddball:
…in our Wolf oven…

Can you feel the envy all the way from Texas?


As to the OP’s question, I prefer them cooked off in the recteq. If no pan, I set to 450°. If using a stone, I set the grill to full and let it run for half an hour so it gets up to 550°-600°, then cook off the pie.

At 450° and no stone, it’s super smokey. At 550°+ with a stone, it’s not very smokey.

Well all be darned. While I have always cooked them in the oven on a dedicated pizza stone, I have never preheated the stone.

I'll have to try pre-heating the oven and stone to 500-550 and see how I like it.

Wow, an instance where SigForum may have saved me money. How often does that happen?