Pizza Stone Alternative

A pizza cooked in the oven at home, or even warming a store bought frozen pizza, will taste much better when done on a pizza stone that is at the proper temperature.  But pizza stones have several drawbacks:

• They are expensive!
• They have a fairly short life before they are “gunked” up and need to be replaced.  About every two years in our house.
• They break every easily if dropped, even from a short distance.
• The round shape makes them suitable for round pizzas but not much else, particularly not well suited for artisan bread baking.

There is a very good alternative to pizza stones that addresses all of these issues – unglazed ceramic or quarry tile.  These tiles are safe for cooking and Alton Brown is widely quoted on recommending inexpensive quarry tile instead of an expensive pizza stone. 

The key is unglazed.  Any glazed tile can release lead into your oven and food and this is NOT good.  Unglazed quarry tiles are made from fired clay as it comes out of the ground. Unglazed ceramic tiles are made from refined clay in a powdered form.  Quarry tiles are a little thicker than ceramic tiles but either are fine for baking.  Because both types are made entirely from earth materials, they are fine if left unglazed.  This allows moisture to pass out of the bread or pizza bottom leading to a nice crisp texture. 

You want to put the tiles in the oven before you turn it on to preheat.  By the time the oven comes up to the cooking temperature, the tiles should be at the right temperature for your bread or pizza.  It might take a little longer for your oven to come up to temperature as it needs to also heat the tiles. If I have a loose dough, then I put it on parchment paper and slide that onto the tiles.  After a few minutes I can slide the parchment paper out from underneath using tongs and the dough is right on the stones for the rest of the cooking time.  If I am using a bread pan, perhaps for baguettes, I put the pan on the stones for a few minutes and then with pot holders slide the bread out of the pan directly onto the stones.

As shown in the above picture, my oven lets me put two rows of four tiles in it for baking so that gives me a 24” x 12” cooking surface, much larger than a pizza stone.  Even if your oven would only let you put three tiles across, that is still well more than double the square footage then a typical pizza stone and the rectangular shape gives you a lot more flexibility in baking different sizes and shapes of bread. 

Cooking pizza on the grill is also great and here is a picture of those same tiles on my Weber gas grill.  I can cook a pizza right on the grates but I like the crispness that I get using the tiles and there is less risk of char on the bottom of the pizza when it is not directly over the flames.  I could put a third row of tiles on that grill, but you don’t want to cut off the air flow in your oven or grill or the top of your bread or pizza will not brown.  You can see in the picture of the tiles in my oven that there is plenty of space in front of and behind the tiles to let the air flow. 

I have been using 6” x 6” unglazed quarry tiles from Metropolitan Ceramics for years.  And here is a picture of one.  When I first started, I could buy individual tiles for about $0.50 a tile at Home Depot.  It appears they no longer carry Metropolitan but I have about a dozen of the tiles from the case of 28 that I bought years ago left in the box.  Below are links to what appears to be very similar unglazed tiles at Home Depot, Lowes, and Amazon.  I also suggest checking out tile stores.  When we redid both our kitchen and the Master Bath, we got much better prices at the tile store than at one of the big chain stores like Home Builder and we could purchase the number of tiles we wanted and did not have to buy by the case.  The tile in this picture has been used at least a dozen times and has just a little bit of discoloring.

https://www.homedepot.com/p/Merola-Tile-Klinker-Red-5-7-8-in-x-5-7-8-in-Ceramic-Floor-and-Wall-Quarry-Tile-6-sq-ft-case-FGA6KRD/300233591 $68.50/case of 23 tiles

https://www.amazon.com/SomerTile-FGA6KRD-Klinker-Ceramic-Quarry/dp/B09NQGWGGL/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=Klinker+Red+5-7%2F8+in.+x+5-7%2F8+in.+Ceramic+Floor+and+Wall+Quarry+Tile&qid=1676321476&s=hi&sr=1-1 $79.53/case of 23 tiles

https://www.lowes.com/pd/Affinity-Tile-Klinker-23-Pack-Red-5-7-8-in-x-5-7-8-in-Satin-Ceramic-Floor-and-Wall-Tile/5014036009 $81.44/case of 23 tiles

These tiles come in cases of 23 tiles and the cost for each of the stores is shown below.  The case price comes out to about $3-4 per tile.  But even at $3 a tile, using three tiles across and two deep would only cost $18 which is a lot less than a pizza stone and give you more cooking area. And you can replace individual tiles when one gets stained to the point that you don’t want to cook on it anymore.  I have had my case of tiles for at least 10 years and only about six tiles have gone in the trash so I am way ahead of the game financially.  It was a shock that the prices are so much higher than when I purchased the tiles I have, but these are primarily used as flooring tiles and all building materials are much more expensive in the last few years. 

As mentioned above, when I first started, I bought six tiles as an experiment for about $3.00.  All of the web sites have a cost of at least $11 for an individual tile so the stores clearly want to sell full cases and not individual tiles.  But I suggest you check out individual stores and see if they have any open boxes and, if so, what is the cost of an individual tile.