Stop Using Cornmeal On Your Pizza Peel (2024)

FAQs

Do you put cornmeal on pizza peel? ›

To use the wooden peel, stretch your dough on a well-floured surface, then sprinkle the peel with semolina or cornmeal (more on this below). Adjust the dough as necessary on the peel and give a quick jiggle to ensure the dough is floating, not stuck, then add your toppings and slide into the oven.

Cornmeal: Cornmeal isn't in the dough, but it's used to dust the pizza pan. Cornmeal gives the pizza crust a little extra flavor and crisp. Most delivery pizzas you enjoy have cornmeal on the bottom crust!

Ultimately, it is up to the individual baker to decide which type of dough they prefer. However, according to us, you should pick semolina over cornmeal for authentic Italian pizza.

This should decrease the warping and help bring your pizza peel back to life! There is no reason a pizza peel should not last you a lifetime. Coat your peel with mineral oil, keep it away from water and high heat, use white vinegar to disinfect it and you will never have to buy another peel again!

Made from durum wheat, semolina flour is coarser than regular flour so it's slower to absorb water. Other types of flour such as rye, rice, corn, and whole wheat (or a combination of two or more) can also be used as peel dust.

Instead, use either flour or semolina flour (or better yet a combo of both).

However, metal pizza peels are more durable and less likely to burn in an oven. A wooden pizza peel is more attractive and feels more natural than a metal one. However, wood pizza peels can be harder to clean and require more maintenance.

Corn meal is not appropriate for New York-style pizza. Some would say semolina isn't either and that only plain flour is used to dust peels for New York-style pizza, but corn meal isn't debatable.

Remember that mineral oil isn't the best finishing oil for the job, so go with something like our food-safe Hemp Oil for easy reapplication after you wash and dry it to prevent your wood pizza peel from warping.

You could spray a non-stick coating like PAM onto the pizza peel, but that is probably unnecessary as long as the pizza peel is clean, dry (no water), and the pizza peel's surface is in good condition. Do not use the pizza peel as a cutting board.

Why put cornmeal on pizza stone? ›

That's cornmeal, hands down. The main reason you sprinkle cornmeal or flour onto the bottom of your pizza tray or pizza stone is so that it will stick to the bottom of the pizza dough. This way when it cooks it won't stick to the pan.

Regular Maintenance Tips for Your Pizza Peel

Avoid soaking your peel, as too much moisture penetrating the wood can make it warp. Let it dry horizontally after washing, check it for damage and apply a coating of food-grade oil as preventive maintenance if needed.

Dusting your pizza peel is a time-honored and essential way to keep the dough from sticking. Many pizza chefs simply use flour, and they like the result.