Choosing The Best Non-Stick Pizza Peel to Prevent Sticking

How many times has your pizza night been ruined because your pizza stuck to the peel? I’ve lost count of mine. Fed up with soggy-bottomed pizzas and messy transfers, I set out on a mission: to find a way to prevent this sticky situation once and for all with a non-stick pizza peel.

I dug deep into the world of pizza peels, searching for a solution that would make transferring pizza into the oven a breeze. And guess what? I found some game-changing tricks and tools that I can’t wait to share with you.

In this guide, I’ll spill the beans on the best non-stick pizza peels and techniques to keep your pizzas from sticking. Say goodbye to ruined pizza nights and hello to smooth transfers and perfect pies!

Why Pizza Is Sticking to the Pizza Peel?

Pizza sticking to the peel is often caused by excess moisture in the dough, which creates a suction effect between the dough and the peel’s surface. Additionally, larger pizzas overloaded with toppings can exacerbate the issue by increasing friction, making it harder to release the pizza smoothly. In essence, the combination of moisture and weight contributes to frustrating sticking problems during pizza transfer.

Types of Pizza Peels

When it comes to pizza peels, there’s a variety of options to choose from. Understanding the differences between these types can help you find the best pizza peels to prevent your pizza from sticking and ensure a seamless baking process.

Wooden Peel

Wood peels have long been a staple in pizzerias, particularly in Naples. Their rustic charm and natural grains provide a surface that’s less likely to create a vacuum with the dough, thus reducing the chances of sticking. However, wooden peels tend to be thicker, which may pose challenges when it comes to maneuvering larger pizzas in and out of the oven. To dive deeper into the comparison between wood peels and metal pizza peels, check out my in-depth comparison here.

Metal Peel

On the other hand, metal pizza peels offer a smoother surface, making them ideal for sliding homemade pizzas effortlessly into the oven. While a steel or aluminum peel can be thinner and more maneuverable, they are more prone to creating a vacuum effect with the dough, potentially leading to sticking issues.

Turning Peel

A turning peel is a specialty tool designed to turn pizzas during baking to ensure an even bake. They are also great for retrieving cooked pies

The Best Non-Stick Pizza Peel

Choosing the right pizza peel can make all the difference in preventing sticky situations. Here’s a breakdown of your options.

Wooden Pizza Peel – The Best Non-Stick Pizza Peel

Wooden peels are a traditional choice, found in pizzerias worldwide, including the birthplace of pizza, Naples. Wood’s natural properties make it a sticking-prevention superhero. The grain of the wood creates less suction between the raw dough and the surface, ensuring smooth transfers every time.

However, wooden peels tend to be thicker than their metal counterparts. This thickness can pose challenges when sliding pizzas onto and off of the peel, potentially deforming the dough. It also makes it trickier to slide the peel under the pizza to turn or retrieve it from the oven.

Despite these challenges, I’m a big fan of wooden pizza peels for launching pizzas into the oven, but I use them in combination with a turning peel.

In summary, wooden peels are ideal for beginners and seasoned pizza makers alike. Their natural non-stick properties make them a go-to choice, despite their thickness.

Metal Pizza Peel

Pizza tends to stick more to metal pizza peels, making them less than ideal for launching pizzas.

However, this doesn’t mean you can’t use a steel or aluminum peel to transfer pizza into the oven. I use it quite often when visiting my parents, who only have a metal peel they bought when they visited Italy a few years ago. With the right technique (more on this in the next section) and a little bit of practice, you’ll have no problem using a metal peel to transfer pizza.

Metal peels have a stronger construction than their wooden counterparts. This means they will last longer and require less maintenance. Plus, their thinner design makes it easier to slide under your pizza in the hot oven. So metal peels are great for handling pizza inside the hot oven, just not launching.

And did you know there’s a way to make a non-stick pizza peel out of metal? The answer is a perforated carrying surface.

Perforated Pizza Peel – Best of Both Worlds

A perforated pizza peel has a carrying surface filled with small holes, usually made from metal. This design allows for a thin carrying surface, merging the non-stick advantages of a wooden peel with the sleek profile of a metal one.

The perforations, or small holes, create a smaller contact surface on the carrying surface, helping to prevent sticking. They also allow airflow, preventing a vacuum from forming between the peel and the dough, further preventing the pizza from sticking.

Another advantage is that it helps eliminate excess flour, which can burn in the oven, create smoke, and result in unpleasant flavors to your pizza.

Choosing a perforated peel with smaller holes for moving pizzas is crucial. Larger holes can cause the dough to sink, making it hard to slide the pizza off the peel. Additionally, heavily topped pizzas can also sink into the holes, so this option is better suited for lighter pizza styles.

In my experience, while a wooden pizza peel is still an excellent option for preventing sticking, a perforated peel offers versatility. You can achieve the best of both worlds with a perforated peel, making it a suitable choice if you prefer owning just one peel.

If you want to delve deeper into perforated pizza peels, check out our article: What Is a Perforated Pizza Peel and Is It Better?

How to Prevent Pizza Peel Sticking

In this step-by-step guide, I’ll walk you through practical steps to prevent pizza peel from sticking and elevate your pizza-making game. Here are the top tips we’ll be exploring:

1. Use a non-stick pizza peel: Opt for a wooden or perforated metal pizza peel to minimize sticking.
2. Dust the peel properly: Choose the right flour for dusting your peel to ensure easy transfer pizza.
3. Avoid overloading your pizza: Keep toppings in check to prevent excess weight.
4. Mind your sauce: Use the right amount to prevent excessive moisture.
5. Minimize time on the peel: Reduce the risk of sticking during transfer.
6. Manage dough hydration: Adjust the hydration of your pizza dough to achieve the perfect balance between stickiness and texture.
7. Incorporate oil wisely: Be mindful of oil in your dough to avoid excess stickiness.

1. Use a Non-Stick Pizza Peel

Choosing the right pizza peel is essential for preventing sticking and ensuring smooth pizza transfer. Opt for a non-stick pizza peel to streamline the process. There are two main options to consider: wooden and perforated metal peels.

Wooden Pizza Peel

Wooden pizza peels offer a classic approach with natural non-stick properties. The texture of the wood grain minimizes the suction between the dough and the peel’s surface. While wooden peels excel at launching pizzas, their thickness may pose challenges during retrieval and removing pizzas.

Perforated Metal Pizza Peel

Perforated metal pizza peels provide an alternative non-stick solution. The perforations allow airflow, preventing vacuum formation between the dough and the peel. With a thinner carrying surface, perforated metal peels offer ease of use during both the launch and retrieval of pizzas.

Selecting the appropriate non-stick pizza peel is crucial for a hassle-free pizza-making experience, reducing the risk of sticking and ensuring seamless pizza transfer.

2. Dusting the Peel with Flour

To ensure the dough doesn’t stick to your peel, lightly dust the peel with flour.

Choose the right flour for dusting

When it comes to selecting the flour for dusting your peel, consider the following options:

• Pizza Flour: While using the same wheat flour as your dough seems intuitive, it can burn in the oven, compromising the taste and texture of your pizza.
• Cornmeal: Cornmeal handles heat better than wheat flour, it can burn in a hot pizza oven or on a pizza stone. It can impart unwanted flavors to your pizza. Additionally, its coarse texture may not align with the traditional Neapolitan pizza experience.
• Semolina: This coarser wheat flour offers excellent sliding properties without sacrificing flavor. Its ability to withstand high temperatures makes it an ideal choice for dusting your peel.

Personally, I prefer using semolina for its superior performance and minimal impact on the pizza’s taste. Discover more about selecting the best semolina in my comprehensive guide.

Don’t Use Parchment Paper

Using parchment paper to transfer the pizza onto a pizza stone or steel is something I see people do all the time. This is however a really bad idea, since parchment is not designed to handle the temperature you want to bake pizza in, and therefore will burn. If you want to read more, check out the article: Why You Should Never Use Parchment Paper on a Pizza Stone.

Application Technique

Once you’ve chosen your preferred dusting agent, apply it generously to the surface of your pizza peel. Ensure that every inch of the smooth surface of the peel is covered to create a barrier between the dough and the peel’s surface.

3. Avoid Overloading the Pizza

To prevent the pizza from sticking to the peel, avoid overloading it with toppings. Even the most reliable non-stick pizza peel will struggle with a heavy pizza.

The excess weight of too many toppings makes it challenging to maneuver the uncooked pizza, exacerbating any sticking issues. Additionally, too much sauce can contribute to dough stickiness, as the extra moisture increases adhesion to the peel.

4. Manage the Sauce

Be mindful of how much sauce you put on your pizza. Too much sauce means more moisture, which can make your dough stick to the peel. Spread the sauce evenly and lightly to avoid this. It’s all about finding the right balance of flavor without making the dough too wet.

5. Minimize Time on the Peel

Time is of the essence when it comes to sticky pizza dough. The longer you leave the pizza on the peel, the more likely it is to get stuck. To avoid this, I always prepare my pizza on a kitchen countertop or another work surface before transferring it to the peel.

Why Prepare on the Countertop?

Preparing the pizza on a countertop allows you to catch any sticking early on. It’s frustrating to realize the dough is stuck when you’re trying to slide it into the oven. By preparing on the countertop, you have the opportunity to address any sticking issues before it’s too late.

If you encounter sticking while transferring the pizza from the countertop to the peel, use a spatula or dough scraper to loosen the dough. Apply a bit of flour if necessary before continuing to slide the pizza onto the peel. This simple step can save your pizza from disaster!

6. Manage Dough Hydration

Hydration plays a crucial role in determining the stickiness of your pizza dough. The higher hydration your dough has, the softer and more sticky it will be.

Simply put, dough hydration LINK refers to the ratio of water to flour in your dough, measured in percentages. For instance, a dough containing 1000g of flour and 600g of water has a hydration of 60%.

How Dough Hydration Affects Stickiness

More water in the dough will make it more sticky. If you’ve ever tried mixing a high-hydration dough, you’ve probably experienced how sticky it is. It sticks to the bowl, to the dough scraper, to your finger – everywhere. Now, imagine that you leave this dough on a pizza peel. Can you visualize how hard it’s going to be to slide that dough into the oven?

How to Deal With High-Hydration Pizza Dough

A solution is to add flour to the dough before stretching it. This will create a flour cover that prevents the moisture of raw dough from being in direct contact with the pizza peel. But make sure to shake off as much excess flour as possible to prevent it from burning in the oven.

What’s the Ideal Dough Hydration?

That’s a hard question to answer. The hydration of your dough will depend on what kind of pizza you want to make, and it’s largely about personal preference. It’s all about finding the balance between stickiness and other features of your pizza dough.

Neapolitan pizza should have a dough hydration of around 60%, according to the AVPN (The True Neapolitan Pizza Association). When you’re working with anything above 70-80% hydration, the dough tends to be very soft, in addition to sticky. This will make the dough hard to work with and transfer onto the pizza peel.

I personally prefer to work with pizza dough between 60% and 65% hydration, as this gives perfectly soft and nice dough without being too sticky. But it’s all about the flour.

Using the Right Flour

If you want to make high-hydration pizza dough, you need the right flour. A stronger flour that can absorb more water. Flour with high protein content and strength can typically absorb more water, without making the dough sticky. Check out my Flour Guide for expert tips and recommendations

7. Incorporate Oil Wisely

Traditionally, Neapolitan pizza recipes don’t include oil in the dough. However, many home cooks add olive oil to their pizza dough for various reasons, such as flavor enhancement and texture improvement.

While oil can enhance the flavor and texture of your pizza dough, it can also increase its stickiness, making it challenging to work with, especially on the pizza peel.

To mitigate this, it’s essential to cover the dough ball with flour before working with it. This creates a protective layer that counteracts the stickiness of the oil. Ensure that every part of the dough is adequately coated with flour to prevent any oily spots. Then, shake off any excess flour to avoid burning in the oven.

Troubleshooting Sticking Issues

Encountering sticking issues with your pizza peel can be frustrating, but fear not! Here are some troubleshooting tips to help you overcome common challenges:

Problem: Dough Tearing

If your dough is tearing or sticking to the peel, try dusting the peel with flour or semolina to create a barrier between the dough and the surface. Additionally, ensure your dough is properly kneaded and stretched to the desired thickness before transferring it to the peel.

Problem: Toppings Sliding Off

To prevent toppings from sliding off during transfer, make sure your pizza is evenly topped and not overloaded with ingredients. You can also gently press down on the toppings to secure them in place before sliding the pizza onto the peel.

Problem: Residue Buildup

Regularly clean and maintain your pizza peel to prevent residue buildup, which can exacerbate sticking issues over time. Use a damp cloth or brush to remove any debris or leftover dough from the surface, and avoid using abrasive cleaners that could damage the peel.

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