Cookaholics Bulletin Board

Carey have you tried milk? I know that my EH flametop recommended curing it with milk. Don't know how big your stone is, but if it fits in another pan, I'd try covering the burn parts with milk and putting it in a low oven, to see it that helps. Alternately, I'd try Barkeeps friend depending on what the mess is.

Pizza making is on my need to do list and I too have an Emile Henry Stone, but I've never used it. I just got a pizza recipe to test from CI, but its for thick crust which I typically don't like, but DH does. I may try that one and then the Artisan One if I can find it online. I have the first book but not the pizza one, but the breads have never failed me. I'm for easy too and prefer thin crusts.

Carey,

To be blunt, I've never thought much of the Emile Henry pizza stone; pizza tiles ought not to be glazed, and you've just experienced why glaze on them is a problem.

However, since it is high-fire ceramic, feel free to use steel wool and/or Ajax to clean it. The glaze is harder than either and shouldn't be scratched.

I've soaked it, scrubbed it with BKF, used the Le Creuset cleaner on it, scrubbed it with a plastic scrubbie pad (all post soaking), used my fingernail (which is sometimes more effective than a scrubbie)....the only thing I haven't used is a SOS pad. It still works perfectly fine, it just looks like a burnt disaster. I have no idea what happened....usually stuff comes off EH easily with a bit of soaking. The best that I can tell is that the problem was that there were holes in the Lahey dough (not when I made the pizza but it must have torn either on sliding onto the stone or during cooking). and this is burnt on tomato sauce. Burnt on cornmeal/flour just sloughs off.

Thanks Josh,

I will give steel wool a try. It's the only thing left that I haven't tried.

I bought a thick unglazed ceramic round for the BGE. I figured since it's the same material as the egg and made by them, it should be fine at higher temp. I couldn't remember what the upper limit temp was for my EH stone.

Carey,

I keep some "stainless steel wool" around for serious scrubbing time. I got it at a kitchen supply store; it's the same stuff we used to use at the bakery where I once worked. It's like steel wool, only each strand is a thin ribbon of stainless steel. Use gloves while using. That's pretty much the ultimate crud remover ... well, that and a paint scraper.