When it comes to making pizza at home, I find that baking it properly is the second most important thing after finding the best pizza dough.
Just consider this: the real Neapolitan pizza must be baked in a 905 °F or 485 °C stone oven. But most home ovens heat up to only 550°F (275–300°C), which is much lower. On top of that, a stone oven is open the whole time, while your home oven stays closed during baking. You think this is not that important? An open oven creates a nice circulation of air, while your home oven won’t. That’s why homemade pizza can easily turn out soggy or undercooked. So essentially, the only thing missing when you try to recreate real Italian pizza at home is an authentic stone oven.
Of course if you have a stone pizza oven at home, that’s a completely different situation. But most of us don’t.
But not anymore. In this recipe, I’ll show you the best way I found to bake pizza at home in a conventional wall oven, so it turns out almost as crispy and delicious as the kind you’d get in an Italian restaurant.
This recipe is the last part of my 4-part How to make homemade pizza series (1. Making the dough; 2. Shaping your pizza dough; 3. Pizza sauce and toppings; 4. Baking your pizza). In this last step, I’m going to show you how to bake pizza at home in a wall oven.
« Previous step: Homemade pizza sauce recipe
How to Bake Pizza in a Wall Oven
Here I give you the quick instructions on how to bake pizza at home first, but make sure to read on to find more detailed explanations and tips below.
- Turn on your oven and set it to the highest heat possible. If you have a convection oven, or better yet one with a pizza setting, turn those settings on.
That’s right. While most homemade pizza recipes call for 400–450°F (200–220°C), the closer you can get to the temperature of a real pizza oven, the more authentic and delicious your homemade pizza will be. - Let your oven warm up completely. This takes at least 20 minutes, but for some models it can take up to one hour.
- Get your pizza ready in a pizza pan with the sauce and toppings. For instructions, see my homemade pizza sauce recipe.
- Place your pizza pan with your pizza on it on the lowest rack of your oven, but not on the bottom.
- Baking time depends on your oven and pizza size. I find that a regular pizza needs about 10 minutes, while a small pizza bakes in about 8 minutes. Please see my tips below to find the best way of baking your pizza at home.
- Your pizza is ready when it has a crisp, slightly browned edge. Take it out of the oven, and let it rest for 1 minute. Your perfectly baked homemade pizza is now ready to be served.
Tips on Baking Your Homemade Pizza
- Use the highest temperature setting on your wall oven. Don’t worry too much about the exact temperature. With a home oven, you really can’t go wrong by setting it to the highest possible temperature.
- Let your oven warm up completely. This takes at least 20 minutes, but for some models it can take up to one hour.
- Use the lowest rack in your oven. Not the bottom, as you can easily burn your pizza that way, but the lowest rack.
- Use pizza setting (if applicable). Some ovens have a dedicated pizza setting. I find this is the easiest way to get a crispy crust. If using the pizza setting, you don’t even have to worry about the next tips.
- Use convection at the beginning and end. In a convection oven, I find you get the best results by using the convection setting for the first and last 2 minutes, and regular top-and-bottom heat in between. (You don’t need to worry about this if you have a pizza setting on your oven.)
- Open the door a few times. If you don’t have a pizza setting, after the first 2 minutes open the oven door every 2 minutes. Then wave an oven mitt a few times to create some air circulation between the oven interior and the kitchen. This helps imitate an open stone oven and release some of the excess moisture that builds up in your oven. This way, your pizza will turn out crisp and just the way you want it.
- Don’t open the door the first 2 minutes.
- Turn your pizza halfway through baking. Most ovens have different temperatures at the back. Turn your pizza 180 degrees halfway through baking so it cooks evenly.
- Some people recommend placing a stone on the bottom of your oven. This can be a pizza stone, or even 2-3 regular bricks. I haven’t tried this method yet, and I can tell you that just by applying the other tricks here, my homemade pizza turns out very much like the kind you’d get in an Italian pizzeria.
If you have any tips or experience with baking pizza at home, share them with us in the comments below.
How to Bake Pizza at Home
Equipment
- Pizza pan
- Wall oven
Materials
- 1 homemade pizza, ready to bake See recipe for instructions
Instructions
- Turn on your oven, set it to the highest heat possible, and let it preheat completely. This takes at least 20 minutes, but for some models it can take up to an hour. If you have a convection oven, or better yet one with a pizza setting, turn those settings on.
- Get your pizza ready in a pizza pan with the sauce and the toppings.
- Place the pizza pan on the lowest rack in your oven, but not directly on the bottom. Baking time depends on your oven and pizza size. I find that a regular pizza needs about 10 minutes, while a small pizza bakes in about 8 minutes.
- Your pizza is ready when the edge is crisp and lightly browned. Take it out of the oven, and let it rest for 1 minute. Your perfectly baked homemade pizza is now ready to be served.
