Reheating Pizza

Many bulletin boards on the web debate the best technique for reheating pizza. One evening a few weeks ago, I had half a pizza left over, medium-thickness, and decided to do some experimentation. Here's the four techniques I tried, listed from best to worst, and how each turned out.

  1. Heat a skillet on the stove top on low or at most medium-low heat. Place the slice of pizza cheese-side down. Pushing it around occasionally so it doesn't stick, leave it there for as long as possible. i.e., don't let the cheese melt off the pizza or otherwise let the slice lose structural integrity. Flip the pizza so the crust is down and loosely cover the skillet with aluminum foil. This reflects the heat, helping keep the top warm even though it isn't in direct contact with the skillet. Push the slice around occasionally so it doesn't stick. When quite hot, remove the aluminum foil and flip the slice once again, heating the cheese side directly for as long as possible. Then eat! Although it takes a while and requires some attention, this makes a good slice with a slightly crispy crust, without any of the flaws of the other techniques.
  2. Place a cookie sheet in the oven and turn the heat as high as it can go. Once it's preheated, put in the slice of pizza. Remove when the cheese is bubbling. This method is as close as one can get to how pizza is made. It yielded a decent slice with a very crusty, browned bottom, a bit too crusty/crunchy for my tastes.
  3. Preheat oven to 325. Put in slice. Remove when hot. This slice ended up with dough that, while not dried out, had no crispness anywhere. Perhaps a compromise between this technique and the previous one would would work quite well.
  4. Microwave. Microwaving pizza produces a too-soft slice with dried-out dough. Not good.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Great experiments. Sounds like lots of fun.
I agree, the second technique sounds like it might be perfect. Next time try not to put the cookie sheet in the oven to preheat. Maybe then the bottom of the slice might not get too crusty/crunchy. I really don't know, just guessing. I would like to try that be we have no oven here...