There are so many different hacks when it comes to cooking pizzas at home. One of them has to be using your oven broiler and cooking the perfect Neapolitan style that you are used to eating at pizzerias.
Cooking Pizza on a Broiler is a popular way through which many pizza enthusiasts are getting the Neapolitan style pizza cooked using a home oven.
This way of cooking pizza can get you the leopard spots that you are looking for on your homemade pizza and if you are ready to explore this method of cooking a pizza using the broiler method then you are on the right post.
In this post, we are going to discuss different ways in which you can cook your pizza using a broiler which is found inside an oven.
A broiler is the heating element that is found inside a pizza oven and every oven has one.
Most of the ovens have a broiler on top of the oven and hence you just need to adjust the oven grill closer to the top of the oven when you want to cook something using the broiler.
There are several ways in which you can cook the perfect pizza using a broiler and an iron skillet or a pan.
I would usually recommend an iron skillet but if you have a pan then you might have to be a little careful especially be careful to not close the oven door when you put the pizza inside.
Method 1: Using a Pan/Iron Skillet and broiler
This by far is the best method and I feel it is really easy to cook pizza this way as well. So, to get started with this all you need is a pan or an iron skillet and place your uncooked pizza on top of it.
Next, you need to cook the pizza on a normal stove and make sure that the base is cooked well. This process would just cook the base and not the toppings or the cheese.
So, you might observe that the base is cooked but not the toppings. Now, while you have been cooking the pizza base, turn ON the broiler in your oven and heat it up for about 10 minutes. This way the heating element would be hot when you insert the pizza.
Make sure that the oven rack is close to the heating element so that the pizza is cooked in high heat. Now, once you see the base of the pizza is done on the stove, you need to move the pan to the oven and place it on the oven rack.
DO NOT CLOSE THE OVEN DOOR when you are cooking a pizza inside the oven because the pan could melt and leaving the oven door ajar is the best thing you can do here.
Even if you are using an iron skillet, it is not needed that you close the oven as all you are doing is heating the top part of your pizza and getting the Neapolitan spotting on your pizza.
The pizza would be cooked in about 1-2 minutes as the heating element is already really hot making it easy to cook pizza inside the oven.
You can remove the pizza and rotate it around according to where it is cooked more. The heating element is going to be designed differently in different ovens so according to your oven you can cook your pizzas to perfection.
The end result after cooking with this method is going to be a perfect Neapolitan style pizza and you can get that in just a few minutes with your home oven.
Method 2- Using a Pan and the Broiler
The second method is pretty similar to the one mentioned above but here you are going to switch the order in which you are cooking your pizza.
In the first-mentioned method, you are cooking the pizza on a stove and then you are cooking it inside the oven but here you are first going to cook the pizza on the broiler, and then you are moving on to the stove, in order to cook the base completely.
This method is better for me as you can cook the pizza toppings and the base as much as you want on the broiler and then you can continue the leftover cooking of the base on a pan.
This works like a charm too, all you need to do is prep your pizza on a pan and have the broiler heat up for 10-15 minutes before you insert the pizza inside the oven and leave the oven door open.
You might want to keep an eye on the pizza and turn it around whenever needed in order to get an evenly cooked pizza from the top with the leopard spotting present on all the sides.
Once you have cooked the pizza on the broiler for about 2-3 minutes, you might want to take the pan and place it on the stove to completely cook the base of the pizza. Make sure you use an oven mitt while making these transfers as the pan is going to be hot.
When done with cooking on the stove, you are ready with your pizza that would look perfect and taste delicious.
Method 3- Using a Pizza Stone and Broiler
This method is pretty easy and it involves using a pizza stone and all you have to do is place a pizza stone on the oven rack and then heat the broiler for about 15-20 minutes.
If you want to get the pizza stone to a higher temperature then you can preheat your oven for about a few minutes so that the stone retains enough heat to get the pizza base cooked properly.
The pizza stone is going to get really hot and this way you would get a nice crispy base that makes a pizza taste amazing.
You can cook longer depending on the thickness of the base but if you are cooking a Neapolitan pizza then you would be done within 1-2 minutes.
This method is pretty quick and you can cook so many pizzas in a few minutes, so do try this method since all you need is a great pizza stone in order to get the job done.
This method does involve a learning curve and you might want to test it out with a few pizzas first before you can go ahead and get perfect with it.
Method 4- Using an Iron Skillet and a Broiler
This method is just another optional method and it is pretty similar to using a skillet. In this method, you can keep the skillet on the gas and heat it up till it is hot and then turn it upside down and keep it under the broiler.
Make sure that your oven rack is not very close to the broiler as you need to fit in the iron skillet.
Also, this method cannot be done with a pan because you never know some elements of the pan might not be able to withstand the heat inside the broiler.
Now. turn the pan upside down and place the pizza on the backside of the pan. The pizzas get cooked within 1-2 minutes but the only downside of this method is that the pizzas cooked are smaller.
Another downside of the method is that it just seems like a lot of work to turn the pan upside down when you can cook it in the pan as discussed in methods one and two above.
The method requires an iron skillet and if you do not have one then you would not be able to go through with this way of cooking and you might have to resort to methods 1 and 2 which in all honesty are much easier.
So do let us know which one of the methods you are going to try at home.
If you have already tried them then do share your experiences with us in the comments below!
If you liked the post then do not forget to share it on social media!
Leave a Reply