How to clean a pizza stone that is black [June-2022]

A quality pizza stone is one of the most important tools for creating your perfect home-cooked pizza. A pizza stone enables your pizza to cook evenly, and it also helps crisp the crust’s bottom. If you’re using a conventional oven or an outdoor grill in your kitchen to prepare pizza, it is recommended to use a pizza stone for the most effective outcome.

If you’ve never had the pleasure of using a pizza stone before or have ever wondered if you’re properly washing your pizza stone, you’re in the right spot. Ensuring you properly clean your pizza stones is vital for making the most of your pizza stone and ensuring that it lasts for many years.

The Tools You’ll Need

There’s a likelihood that you have everything you require to scrub your stone clean. The ideal cleaning tool for a pizza stone should be thin enough to slide beneath the food pieces stuck to the rock but rough enough to clean the stone. If your pizza stone needs cleaning, use one of these tools:

Stone brush
Bench scraper
Table knife
Scouring pads
Toothbrush

How to Avoid Cleaning Your Pizza Stone

The most common thing to stay clear of for cleaning your stone pizza is detergent. Since a pizza stone is a mostly porous material, it can absorb any soap you put on it. So do not apply soap to it, or you’ll be eating soap-flavored pizza next time you’re using that pizza pan.

Instead, only use a moderate amount of water. Only use the amount of water that is needed to have any to wash off food particles or residue. Avoid immersing your stone in water. If your stone gets too wet, it may retain too much moisture, causing the pizza’s crust to cook improperly. Additionally, it can break if you put the damp rock into a heated oven, such as that of the Ooni Koda.

Important: It is important not to use oil for cleaning the pizza stones. The stone naturally absorbs the fat absorbed by the food items you prepare.

How to Remove Food that has been Burned from Your Pizza Stone

There are times when you’ll discover that no matter how much you scrub or scrape your pizza stone, a few burned bits of Food cannot be removed. If you aren’t ready to give up, you can try a thorough cleaning of your oven. This is an approach that typically performs well.

Your oven should be set at 500°F.
Place the pizza stones on the top rack of your oven.
Let your stone bake for one hour.
Now and then, check your stone to determine if any grease bubbles have formed and then burst.
After the bubbles stop, begin the auto-clean cycle in your oven when the bubbling stops. Do not be concerned if your stone begins to smoke. Based on the amount of fat and burned food present on the rock, it could create quite a bit of smoke. During this procedure, the charred pieces of Food will burn off.
After the cleaning cycle is completed, wait for the oven to cool.
After your oven has cooled, please take out the pizza stone and clean it with an unclean cloth.

If a deep cleanse cycle isn’t enough to clean your stone, you could employ medium-grit sandpaper. On the other hand, sandpaper should only be used as a last resort. Scrape away only the burned Food and not other materials; you may permanently damage your pizza stone.

Tips Use less flour and ensure you use semolina flour for the pizza peel. However, even if it gets burned, it will not give you the bitter taste that top-quality pizza flour will.

How do you remove stains from your pizza stone?

An unclean pizza stone is an extremely well-used pizza stone. Therefore, there’s no reason to clean up stains off your rock. However, if you’re troubled enough by the colors in your stone that you need them to be removed, there is a reliable way to remove the stains.

Scrape food debris away using an e-spatula or brush.
Mix equal amounts of baking soda and water to form the paste (1 tablespoon each will suffice).
Place the paste on the stain. Using an instrument, blend to incorporate the powder into the paint using an upward motion until the stain has disappeared.
Clean the paste off with an aqueous cloth.
Place your stone in a spot to completely dry before you use it.

If you’re trying to get rid of grease stains, apply the paste to the color and let it rest for a few minutes. Then, scrub the stain with a toothbrush and wipe it off with a moist cloth.

Be aware that it’s normal for your pizza stone to have spots. Stains on pizza stones usually result in a better tasting pizza and may even prevent Food from adhering to your stone.

Different types of pizza stones

There are a variety of pizza stones, and each one should be handled differently. The most popular pizza stones are ceramic Cordierite, fireclay, and soapstone.

Ceramic

Pizza stones made of ceramic are usually constructed from clay cooked in the kiln. Therefore, pizza stones made of ceramic are among the most inexpensive and easy to locate.

Cordierite

Cordierite can be described as a form of ceramic, but cordierite pizza stones possess certain characteristics that are more durable than the typical pizza stones made from ceramic. Cordierite is an elemental mineral that occurs naturally in crystals. The crystals are added to ceramics to increase their durability. In addition, Cordierite is an absorbent but non-absorbent lead-free substance known to last longer than regular ceramic.

Fireclay

It is also a ceramic used to create pizza stones. It is made of fine-grained natural soil and water. It is heated to a very high temperature to produce an extremely hard rock. Pizza stones are generally one of the least expensive stones to purchase. However, since they are porous and brittle, they can easily crack.

The issue with ceramic pizza stones, such as cordierite stones, is their brittleness when faced with rapid temperature fluctuations. If a rock made of ceramic is overheated or cools too fast, it may break or crack.

Soapstone

Soapstone is a natural stone with a mineral composition made up of magnesite and talc. Soapstone is very dense, which means it can hold heat longer than conventional cookware. It also implies soapstone pizza stones require more time to get heated. In addition, soapstone is a natural nonporous stone, meaning that it will absorb less oil than ceramic stones.

Baking Steel/Pizza Steel

A relatively new product is baking steel, also known as pizza steel. Pizza steels operate similar to pizza stones but are almost impervious to damage. Pizza steels can even reach greater temperatures than stones, making them ideal for creating crisp, thin-crust pizzas. Since pizza steel is constructed out of metal, you’ll have to season it to avoid rust regularly.

If you cook in a conventional home oven, choose pizza steel over a pizza stone. It carries heat better, which allows your pizzas to have a more crispy crust.

In season or not in season? Pizza Stone

If or when to season pizza stones is a highly debated issue. However, there are numerous ways to strengthen a pizza stone. However, as any pizza chef will tell you, you shouldn’t sprinkle your pizza stone with seasoning.

In the case of cookware, the seasoning procedure involves adding olive oil to the bakeware and then applying heat (usually using the oven for baking it). The idea is that baked-in oil will create an extra layer of protection for the bakeware, which can help it last longer and keep foods from adhering to the surface.

Many websites and articles urge pizza enthusiasts to spice up their pizza stones. Unfortunately, this is a step that you can completely skip. Instead, suppose you go directly to the company that makes the stone. In that case, you’ll notice that the companies that make and sell pizza stones don’t recommend seasoning their stones with oil or even outright discouraging oil, claiming that applying oil to the stone can cause damage.

No evidence topping pizza stones with salt can make them last longer. Pizza will not stick when the stone is used appropriately to prevent the food items from sticking to the rock. The pizza stone must remain extremely warm when baking pizza. When temperatures are high, the pizza will dry out, not stick. The ideal temperature is 900 degrees (482 degrees Celsius).