What Is a Pizza Steel?

I invented the first one in 2012. It's called the Baking Steel®, and it started the whole category. Here's what a pizza steel is, why it works, and how to use one.

Why steel works

A home oven tops out around 500 to 550°F. A pizzeria oven runs much hotter. You can't change your oven, but you can change what the pizza sits on.

Steel conducts heat roughly 18 to 20 times better than a ceramic pizza stone. The moment your dough hits the steel, heat rushes into the bottom of the crust. That's what gives you oven spring, char and a crust that's crisp instead of pale and soft.

It also holds a lot of heat and gives it back quickly. After one pizza comes off, the steel recovers fast, so the second pizza comes out like the first. That's where a stone falls behind.

Do pizza steels really work?

I put a thermocouple on one to find out, so I could stop guessing.

One Original, a Monogram electric oven set to 550°F, cold start, probe on the surface of the steel and a second probe reading the air.

The steel hit 553°F at thirty minutes and 597°F at an hour. So it gets where it needs to go, and then some.

But the number that matters isn't the preheat. It's what happens when you open the door. Sixty seconds with the door open and the oven air fell to 401°F. The steel was still sitting at 513°F. That gap is the whole reason a steel works. Air loses its heat the moment you open the door. Fifteen pounds of carbon steel does not. Your pizza doesn't bake on the air, it bakes on the steel.

Then I turned on the broiler, because I like to. The steel went from 585°F to over 700°F in under three minutes and leveled off around 708°F.

Your oven can't get to 700. Your steel can.

One run, one oven, and I'll say plainly that I sell the thing I tested. Your oven will read differently than mine. I bought a $500 thermocouple rig to get these numbers because I wanted to actually know, instead of repeating what everyone says about preheating. More ovens are coming: gas, convection, the Pro and the MC Edition.

Full data, every reading: How Long to Preheat a Pizza Steel? I Put a Thermocouple on It

Is a pizza steel just regular steel?

It's the finishing that makes it a cooking surface.

A Baking Steel starts as low carbon steel, cut to size. Then it gets surfaced flat, because a plate that rocks on your oven rack cooks unevenly and a warped one never comes back. The edges and corners get broken so you can carry fifteen pounds of hot metal without worrying about your hands. Then it's seasoned by hand with organic flax oil and baked, the same way you'd season a cast iron pan, except it's done before it ships. You open the box and make pizza.

No coatings. Nothing to wear out. It gets better the more you cook on it, and it'll outlive you.

Every one is still cut, finished and seasoned in my dad's shop in Massachusetts, the same shop where I grabbed the first plate in 2012.

Pizza steel vs. pizza stone

A stone does the same job, slower.

Stones are ceramic or cordierite, and ceramic is a poor conductor. It takes longer to preheat, it gives heat back slowly, and after the first pizza it needs time to recover before the second one bakes like the first.

Stones also crack. Thermal shock, moisture, a knock on the counter. Most people who've owned one have broken one. A steel doesn't crack, doesn't chip and doesn't need replacing.

Where a stone still wins: it's lighter and it's cheaper. If you make pizza twice a year, a stone is fine. If you make pizza because you love making pizza, you'll want the steel.

I wrote the full comparison here: Baking Steel vs. Pizza Stone

How much does a pizza steel cost?

Pizza steels generally run between about $50 and $200, and the spread comes down to thickness, size, flatness and whether it arrives ready to cook on.

The Baking Steel Original is $139. It's 14" x 16", a quarter inch thick, fifteen pounds, seasoned by hand and backed for life.

Worth doing the math on the other side of it. A stone is cheaper up front, and most people buy more than one over the years. A steel is a thing you buy once.

What thickness and size do you need?

Thickness. A quarter inch is the sweet spot for most home ovens. It holds enough heat to bake four or five pizzas back to back and it still preheats in an hour. Go thicker and you store more heat, which matters if you're running pizzas all night, but it's heavier and it takes longer to come up to temperature. Go thinner than a quarter inch and you lose the thermal mass that makes the whole thing work.

Size. Measure your oven rack and subtract an inch on each side so air can move. Most home ovens take the 14" x 16" Original comfortably.

One or two. If you make a lot of pizza, a second Original on another rack will do more for you than one bigger steel. Two racks, two pizzas, and the oven recovers between rounds.

How to use one

• Put the steel on the upper rack of your oven.
• Preheat for 60 minutes at your oven's highest setting.
• Launch your pizza and bake 5 to 7 minutes.

For the full method, including the broiler trick, read How to Use a Baking Steel in a Home Oven.

It's not just for pizza

Bread, focaccia, English muffins and bagels all bake better on steel. Flip it over and it works as a griddle on your stovetop or grill for smash burgers, pancakes and grilled cheese.

Where the first one came from

In 2012 I was sitting in my office at my dad's steel shop, reading a Wall Street Journal article about Modernist Cuisine. One line said steel conducts heat better than stone. I grabbed a steel plate from the plant, took it home, and made pizza on it that Sunday. Every Baking Steel® is still made and shipped from that same shop in Massachusetts.

The whole story is here: Who Invented the Baking Steel.

Which one should you get?

Start with the Original. It's 1/4 inch thick, 15 pounds, and fits most home ovens. If you end up making a lot of pizza, a second Original on another rack will do more for you than one bigger steel.

You can see every size in our pizza steel collection.

Andris Lagsdin, inventor of the Baking Steel®