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Randall Nortman Randall Nortman is offline
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Default freezing pizzas?

On 2007-09-21, anthony > wrote:
[...]
> I've never tried freezing pizza, hence the question -- how
> satisfactory would it be to partially-cook all the pizzas in advance
> and then freeze them, and pop them into the oven for a final high-temp
> 5 minute blast on the night? Or should I prepare, do all the toppings,
> and then freeze uncooked?


Freezing is how I store leftover pizza. I usually just reheat a slice
at a time in a countertop toaster oven, which is OK. It comes out a
bit more dry than when it was fresh, and the flavors tend to be a bit
muddled, but the crust is crisp. Microwaves do bad things to bread
and crusts. I think reheating on a stone is a good idea, but only
after it has mostly thawed, so you need to thaw some other way --
maybe on a pan on a rack above the stone?

Freezing it uncooked will likely affect the crust texture, as it tends
to degrade the gluten bonds. I'm not sure if it would be better to
thaw first or put the frozen raw pizza straight in the oven. I think,
if you have time, that you might experiment a bit to see what works.
Make two pizzas -- freeze one raw, bake one. Slice and freeze the
baked one, and test different ways of reheating the next day, then
test baking the frozen raw one. Make a couple of frozen raw ones and
test different thaw/reheat methods on that, too, if you have the time
and enough stomachs to dispose of the finished product.

--
Randall