Wooden Pizza Peel ?

[muddy4x4]

How does one season a wooden pizza peel ?
I recently brought one to try. We had a pizza party and the day went from damp to soaking.
I had read somewhere that when it gets damp, a wooden peel is much better than an alloy one.
Not a great success, had to use copious quantities of flour / polenta / semolina and ended up going back to my alloy peel, as it still worked better than the wooden one.
Having had a search of www land, can't find any 2 people who seem to agree what to do to get a wooden peel working really well.
So I thought I would ask the WFO collective

[turkey]

I would guess keep it super dry, keep rubbing fine flour into it to make sure.

Also work fast and once you roll the dough out you can coat it lightly in oil to stop the moisture from the tomato sauce getting into it which might help.

[rivergirl]

I can only go by my wooden boards and bowls I put them into a cool oven to make sure that they are dry , they would go mouldy if left.y

[cannyfradock]

Although wooden peels are used, I thing the majority of us have the aluminium type.

When I use the mobile WFO, I have a wooden pizza paddle for prepping the pizza. This gets transferred to a short handled alu pizza peel for feeding into the oven and I use a long handled alu pizza peel for turning and retrieving the pizza from the oven.

We did have a member who posted how he made a wooden pizza peel/paddle from scratch.....and stated which oils to use to preserve the wood......wish I could find that post.

terry

[faz]

Here it is Terry

ukwoodfiredovenforum.proboards.com/index.cgi?action=display&board=justcooking&thread=441&page=1

[Tom B]

I use a wooden peel to put the pizza into the oven and a metal one to take the pizza out. I dust my hand with semolina flour and rub it over the surface of the wooden peel, get the dough aboard, apply the tomato sauce , cheese, and toppings. Then I shake the peel gently in a side to side direction until the pizza moves easily and put it into the oven. The wooden peel has always been completely dry in use, and I have never had a problem with it at all. Just my take on this

[greensheepuk]

My current use is along the same lines as Tom B above on this one. I used to use an aluminium paddle but found it took too much flour/semolina to stop the pizza from sticking which impaired the pizza so made a wooden peel from a pine floorboard and sealed it with 3-4 coats of an anti-bacterial kitchen worktop oil (of which I have a lot left if you're interested). So just a dusting of flour, after tapping the excess off, will keep the pizza from sticking. I can't comment on how it would perform in the rain but I'd think a well oiled wooden peel would be about as resistant to water as a well oiled worktop would be. Do you know how your peel has been preserved?

[littlebritaly]

I use wooden peels to put the pizza into the oven, I never ever use steel for this unless I'm forced to.

With a wooden peel I hardly ever even have to flour it (the pizza has enough semolina on the underside already), In pop the base onto the peel, top it, a little shake to make sure pizza moves then straight into the oven.

I've cooked at a rate of 120+ pizzas an hour using this technique and hardly ever have a problem.

If by any chance you mess up and something soaks into the peel (tomato, olive oil etc), give the peel a quick wash with plenty of water then hold the peel in the centre of the oven for a few seconds (don't put it on the floor) this will quickly dry the peel out.

I don't season the peels at all.

[cannyfradock]

Fascinating thread guys!.....I've picked up lots of tips.

Thanks Faz. I've sticky'd Scottme's brilliant pizza paddle making thread to the top of the "just cooking" category of the "Wood-fired oven cooking and baking" board.

Terry

[muddy4x4]

Thank you Guys so much, I will experiment with all your techniques ! Just to make clear, we were in a gazebo when it was pouring with rain, almost suddenly the pizzas wouldn't slide of the alloy peel. To get it to work I had to use a mountain of flour and that spoiled the pizza base. Will let you know how I get on ! Thank you !

[pizzajohn]

Alloy pizza peel and pizzas not sliding ?, I have this problem so I use the wooden one for loading the pizza into the oven and then I use a zio pepe small round peel for turning when cooking. I'm sure it's down to the temperature of the ali paddle, when it's cold nothing slides from it, wait till the summer and it'll be fine or warm it up near the dome of the oven in between cooking - watch you don't blacken it with smoke.