📝 Cooking Hack: Baking Pizza with Parchment Paper

In my experience, baking pizza on a cast iron pizza pan is as close as you can get to having a wood-burning pizza oven at home. Yet, transferring the pizza dough onto the heated cast iron pan can be quite challenging. I struggled with this until I discovered a game-changing trick: using parchment paper to line the cast iron pan.

I can’t recall where I first learned this trick, but I’m certainly grateful for it. It has made homemade pizza-making much simpler and less stressful. Here’s how it works: start by placing a sheet of parchment paper on a cutting board. Then, assemble your pizza directly on top of the parchment paper. Next, carefully transfer the pizza (parchment paper and all) onto your preheated pizza stone in the oven (I typically set the temperature to around 475°F).

Bake the pizza for about 8 minutes, then carefully remove the parchment paper. Rotate the pizza pan and continue baking for another 10-12 minutes, or until the crust is golden and the cheese is bubbly. Once the pizza is done, slide it back onto the cutting board. Voila! No mess, no fuss… And most importantly, no more burnt pizza stuck to the stone or oven bottom!