I have lost count of the number of times I have been asked whats the best pizza stone for making amazing home made pizzas. The answer to that question is it depends. It depends on the users individual circumstances. Basically there are a number of different things to consider before buying your perfect pizza stone.
Things to consider before buying a pizza stone
- Size
- Shape
- Material
- Maintenance
What is the best size for my pizza stone
This is probably one of the most important elements when choosing a pizza stone. The key to what size you should choose is of course the size of your oven. A conventional oven doesn’t reach the really high temperatures required to produce an authentic wood fired result. A good pizza stone helps achieve a higher and even temperature when baking your pizza.
To get the stone to reach an authentic wood fired temperature it helps if it is as tight a fit as possible into your oven.
If possible you want the stone to be touching the sides of your oven which allows it to heat up quicker and retain the heat longer.
Obviously make sure its not so tight a fit that you can’t remove the stone from your oven
Shape wise it is for this reason we generally prefer rectangular pizza stones. The effect is slight but in our opinion can make a difference.
What shape pizza stone should I get
So we kinda covered this a little bit above. They tend to come in either square, rectangular or round shapes. We like to get a really tight fit into the oven as mentioned above so for this reason we tend to prefer the rectangular shaped ones.
The performance difference is small however so if you really desire a round one for some reason then its not going to matter that much if you decide to go for that.
It kind of comes down a little bit to personal preference. For some the only authentic pizza shape is the circle! Just remember though you can still cook a round pizza pie on a rectangle pizza stone 😉
What material should my pizza stone be made of
Despite their name they do actually come made from various different materials and not as you might imagine just stone. The most common materials used are:-
- Stone
- Clay
- Cast Iron
- Ceramic
Ideally you want your stone to be as porous as possible. This draws out moisture from the dough during the cooking process which helps to create that amazing thin crispy crust that only a true artisan pizza can boast. In our experience a stone or clay material does this in the most efficient manner. The effect can be slight over the other materials so thats not to say the others are all useless but hey we are in pursuit of perfection here!
