When your pizza sticks to the peel, is that a homemade pizza nightmare, or just an annoyance with a quick fix?

Remain calm. Panic is the enemy. There is no reason anything here needs to end in a calzone moment. Even though it's stuck to the peel, you still have a pizza.
 
This hasn’t happened to you yet? Good for you.

But you will do it. Pizza Life is peppered with Calzone Moments.

Here's how it happens, and here's how to recover with grace, style, and aplomb enough to have angels cheering you from the pizza heavens.

​You’re in the kitchen.

The oven has been preheating for an hour.

Even though you’re making only one pizza, you’ve set up your mise en place beautifully.
 
You’ve stretched the pie, applied the toppings, are ready to launch—and the phone rings.
 
Or something.
 
Somehow, whatever it was, you were distracted. The pizza sat on the peel much longer than it should have, especially in a hot kitchen.
 
And now, that moment has crystallized before you. You see it, frozen in time, vivid and loathsome and soaked in dread. You stand there, staring at your pizza.
 
 
Stuck to the peel.
 
Don’t panic.
 
You’ve got this. You will recover. Get cocky if you wish. Assume an attitude of success and carry it through to real world pizza baking free from the heartbreak of calzone.
 
Step one: Have you tried blowing beneath it?
 
 
Yes, it sounds silly.
 
It’s one of the silliest things that can change everything about the moment.
 
With your thumb and index finger, gently lift the edge of the dough.
 
Move your lips close to the edge as if you’re about to kiss your flat, doughy lover.

And at the last moment, instead of a kiss, puff a little bit of air beneath the raw pizza.
 
 
It’s almost magical.
 
The pizza billows ever so faintly, like a freshly laundered bed linen suddenly being spread across your pizza lover’s California king.

The dough rises off the peel just enough.
 
It’s almost like a hovercraft covered in cheese as it becomes momentarily weightless.
 
Once you’ve done that and it settles again, jiggle the peel horizontally.
 
Does the pizza slide? If so, launch as usual.
 
But sometimes, you’ll reach what seems to be the point of no return. You’ve passed the event horizon of pizza peel adhesion reversal to a place where puffing air is not an option.
 
 
That pizza is just stuck.
 
Here’s a method that nobody ever talks about. I have no idea why.
 
Take a pizza serving pan.
 
Gently place the pan upside down over your raw pizza.
 
Yes, it feels wrong. That’s because it is.

Do it anyway.
 
Next, place your non-dominant hand over the serving pan, holding it against the pizza.

Grab the handle of the peel with your dominant hand, and...

Quickly turn the whole arrangement upside down.
 
You now have a peel on top of an upside-down pizza on top of a serving tray on the countertop.
 
 
Halfway to a solution!
 
Lift the peel away.
 
You now have an upside-down pizza staring at you.
 
Thank you and good night!
 
Kidding.
 
Ignore any judgment the pizza seems to be casting in your general direction.
 
Then, take your semolina (or whatever else with which you’re dusting your peel), and generously dust the bottom of the upside-down pizza.
 
Put the peel back over the pizza, then reverse the flip.

The raw pizza is now back, right-side up, atop the peel.
 
Take away the serving tray. Give the peel a horizontal jiggle so you can be sure the pizza is free and easy.
 
 
If so, go ahead and launch.
 
If it’s still stuck (and I can't imagine why it would be, unless you're only pretending to dust the pizza and peel), maybe this really is a Calzone Moment.
 
Yes, calzones happen.

Try to remain philosophical.

​Pizza is alive, pizza is responsive, pizza does not lie, you may dislike what's about to happen, but pizza is not judgmental.
 
If pizza had shoulders, it would shrug off this moment.
 
As for you, you should shrug it off as well.
 
There will be more pizzas. And more important, you’ve survived this moment and found that calzones are actually not so bad.
 
Free your pizza.
 
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The puff-of-air method beneath a stuck pizza is just one of the many useful tips inside my weird and award-winning pizzamaker’s manual, Free The Pizza: A Simple System For Making Great Pizza Whenever You Want With The Oven You Already Have. If you’re just beginning your pizza-making journey, it’s a good place to start because it doesn’t force you to make any decisions beyond making a pizza. It’s simple a step-by-step guide for getting from zero to pizza and amaze your friends and family. And really, yourself as well. That first fabulous pizza is a glorious moment. Learn more right here.