Even though this may appear like an unnecessary addition to the kitchen, a baking stone can really become a fundamental tool for the home. They are widely used in making delicious concoctions such as homemade pizza and good for other forms of bread and dishes like casseroles or cookies that will require especially even distribution of heat.
The intense heat from its porous surface usually pulls moisture from the outside of your dough to produce a perfectly crunchy crust. Also, baking stone widely called a pizza stone truly mimics the brick oven’s conditions.
It let you cook or bake directly on the heat source, offering you a stronger heating tool and even cooking. You may find yourself just leaving a one in the oven always!
Using Your Baking Stone
Normally, you will place the baking stone in the oven as you preheat it. It is better to insert it in a cold oven and allow it preheat with your oven. If you use your hot oven to put it, you risk it cracking because of thermal shock. Your hot surface will create the best results.
When you cook something like pizza, it is better to place the oven’s rack closer to the top of your oven. For other baked goods or bread, orient it in the middle.
Now, there is no need to oil or grease your pizza stone, since it does not nonstick. If you are using a peel, I suggest sprinkling cornmeal on pizza or bread bottom so it will slide off a little easier.
What to Purchase
There’re different kinds of baking stones, which include variations in sizes, shapes, even material, even though most are ceramic or clay. Check out these stones below.
Lodge Pro-Logic P14P3 Cast Iron
This will save you time and permit you to dive into cooking. Apart from baked goods just like the ever-well-known pizza, Lodge recommends roasting vegetables and cooking pork chops as well as other cuts of meat on the tool. Also, you can cook high-fat baked products like cookies on the lodge cast iron pan without fear.
Kitchen Aluminum Pizza Peel
Irrespective of which you decide is right for you, I greatly recommend obtaining a pizza peel for safety. To correctly use a pizza stone, you have to always preheat it in the grill or oven. This implies that you’ll be working on an amazingly hot surface and it is all very easy for you to accidentally burn.
Sur La Table Baking Steel
Though less common, a serious pizza connoisseur or baker may want to consider having a baking steel. Also, the ideal thin crust pizzas are usually baked at the highest possible temperatures, and although the home oven wouldn’t get this hot, the steel is oven safe a maximum of 1800ºF! You can safely make use of it in the hottest setting the oven has to give without bordering on it breaking. This has eighteen times traditional stones conductivity.
In Conclusion
No matter the baking stone you have decided is good for your kitchen, you will find that it will add to the cooking experience, not only with bread and pizzas but almost everything you prepare in the grill or oven. Pizza night is going to be more fun and you will never find yourself with a burnt or soggy crust again!