Why Does My Ooni Pizza Burn? (Let’s Find Out) 2022
Last updated on September 11th, 2023 at 02:13 pm
Pizzas are never fun and delicious when they get burnt. Even the aroma becomes less attractive.
Your Pizza could get burnt on your watch for multiple reasons.
It can be a result of Leaving Your pizza in the oven too long, which is the most obvious of the reasons.
But the method you use in baking your Pizza determines how fast it will burn depending on the heat source.
Ooni pizza burns when there is a supply of excessive heat to the oven. Also, high amounts of sugar, oil, and flour cause the Pizza to burn. Additionally, using cold dough or the wrong kind of flour can make your Ooni pizza burn more easily.
Why Does the Bottom of My Pizza Burn?
There are various reasons why your Pizza can get burnt; I’ll explain some of the reasons below.
#1. Too much heat.
If you use an oven with a heat source below, you are probably getting too much direct heat on your pizza steel.
This will cause the Pizza to cook unevenly, and sometimes you could burn the pizza bottom because of much heat coming from underneath.
You should try and aim for pleasant even temperatures for pizza cooking.
If you have too much heat from above or below, you will encounter problems with one side of the pizza cooking faster than the other.
#2. Too much sugar.
Another ingredient you often find in pizza dough is sugar. But sugar doesn’t play well with high heat.
It is the first thing that will brown and burn in a dough recipe.
Having too much sugar in your dough will give you the wrong results because you require sugar for recipes cooked more slowly at lower temperatures; higher temperatures need little or no sugar at all.
#3. Excess flour on your peel.
Too much flour on your peel can make your pizza bottom burnt because flour is a dry ingredient, and it can burn more easily.
On transferring your Pizza to the oven, try using only the required amount of flour to stop your Pizza from sticking.
#4. Cold dough.
Great Pizza begins with the crust. It is better to bring your dough out of the refrigerator for around 2 hours before stretching and cooking it in the oven.
Using cold dough can cause the pizza toppings’ not to cook as fast as the bottom.
#5. Toppings are not cooking.
You should cook some toppings as meat should before adding to your Pizza because the meat may take longer to cook when placed in the oven.
If your toppings aren’t cooking in line with your base, you need to adjust your toppings to cook evenly.
#6. Too much oil in your dough.
A lot of pizza recipes ask for Olive oil in the dough. This is because oil and other fats lead to heat well, speeding up the baking process.
But it will also make your Pizza burn faster. So when baking in a hot home oven, consider leaving the oil out or reducing the amount in the dough.
#7. Using the wrong type of flour.
Flour contains carbohydrates, including small amounts of sugar. How fast your pizza bottom burns also depends on the type of flour used.
Italian pizza flour bakes best in high temperatures. It is recommended for baking pizza in your home oven because the flour blend is specifically put together to handle high heat and avoid burning.
How Do I Stop My Ooni Pizza From burning?
In most cases, high amounts of heat from beneath cause the Pizza to burn.
To prevent this, you have to lower the temperature of your oven or add a buffer between Pizza and the heating element.
Below are some more guidelines on how to stop your Pizza from burning.
#1. Lean a metal over the opening of the oven when heating it.
This process is advisable because it can help increase the temperature. If the front is open, it takes a while to reach 450 °C, and can even take longer if the temperature is windy.
Using an aluminum peel to cover up the opening will reflect the heat giving you a reading of over 500°C before launch and around 475°C during launch.
#2. The temperature should be at full blast.
If you turn your temperature down as an attempt to stop your Pizza from burning, it may instead make the pizza burn because the Pizza will take longer to cook at a lower temperature.
The crust of your Pizza will not get brittle or dry, and it will get the correct crispy texture when cooked at the right temperature.
A high oven temperature ensures evenly melted Cheese over the entire Pizza and creates a perfectly cooked crust.
#3. Use a stopwatch for timing.
Using a Stopwatch is effective because learning how long you can leave your Pizza before turning it in for the first time will help replicate it time after time.
As you can’t see from the back, you can’t tell if it’s burned until it’s too late.
So it is advisable to wait for 15-20 seconds after launch, and then keep turning after every 15-20 seconds until it is cooked.
#4. Use a wooden Peel for launch.
A wooden peel is generally the best option to transfer the Pizza into the oven because it’s thick, sturdy, and stick-resistant.
The flat aluminum peel from Ooni can stick. Therefore, turning or removing the Pizza from the oven is better.
Also using the wooden peel for launch is preferable because the surface texture holds some of the flour when used for the first time; this will help you use less flour.
#5. Don’t over flour the peel.
Try not to drench the peel as the flour burns on the pizza stone. Regular flour or a 50/50 mix of semolina and flour is advisable to stop the pizza dough from sticking to the peel.
#6. Be quick in Making the Pizza on the peel.
Most people can’t get the pizza onto the peel without messing it up.
To avoid burning, you have to get all of your ingredients ready and be very quick in adding the toppings to the Pizza once it is on the peel.
Put it in the oven before it settles in and starts to stick.
#7. Use a round turning peel.
A round turning peel helps you turn the Pizza and you can use it to remove the Pizza from the oven and deliver it to the table.
Remember to leave it close to the stove so that you won’t have to heat Skelta and look for it mid-bake.
#8. Use a hot or warm sauce.
Using hot sauce on your Pizza will help to cook in the middle. First of all have your sauce warmed up, whether homemade or from a jar.
Cooking the sauce before baking the Pizza will give the sauce an even more cooked flavor.
#9. Use dried Cheese.
Always make sure your fresh mozzarella cheese is dried up for at least 15 minutes before putting it on your Pizza hence it comes in a little wet bag, be sure to tear it into smaller pieces.
Your Cheese needs an extra step of time and care so that your Pizza will retain its flavor and good structure.
Also, wet Cheese can make the top of your Pizza soggy, and it might not cook well.
Conclusion
A common setback when baking Pizza is that the bottom can burn often. This can be a result of the ingredients on your Pizza.
The most common reason your pizza bottom burns is that you placed it too close to the heat source.
Managing the heat and temperature and observing the guidelines above should fix the issue.
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