Thinking about opening a pizza restaurant but don’t know where to start? A key part of opening a pizzeria is setting up the kitchen. It is a must to have pizza shop equipment that is suitable for daily use and cater to every need of your customers. You may not want to spend all your money on pizza shop equipment, but at the same time you want them to be efficient and durable. Here we have prepared a guide for you to help you choose pizza shop equipment and tools.
Making pizza is more than just baking the dough
In addition to preparing the dough, you’ll need to quickly roll, shape and topping it, then bake and eat it. All of these processes require specific pizzeria equipment, tools, and supplies. In order to make the perfect pizza, you need to know which pizzeria equipment is right for you and meets your expectations.
What pizza shop equipment do you need?
- 1. Pizza oven
This is a crucial piece of equipment for baking pizzas. There are different types such as deck ovens, convection ovens, and conveyor ovens.
How important is the oven for baking pizza?
The pizza oven plays a crucial role in baking a delicious pizza. Here are some reasons why the oven is important:
Even Baking: A high-quality pizza oven distributes heat evenly, ensuring that the pizza cooks uniformly. This helps prevent under cooked or overcooked sections of the pizza.
Crust Texture and Flavor: The type of oven used can greatly impact the texture and flavor of the pizza crust. A well-heated oven can create a crispy crust with a nice chewy texture.
Cooking Time: The right oven can bake a pizza efficiently at the appropriate temperature, reducing cooking time and ensuring that the pizza is ready to serve in a timely manner.
Consistency: Consistent temperature control in a good oven helps maintain consistency in the quality of the pizzas produced. This is essential for building a loyal customer base.
Capacity: The size and capacity of the oven determine how many pizzas can be baked at once. This is important for managing orders during peak hours in a busy restaurant.
Versatility: Some ovens offer versatile features like different heat settings, allowing you to experiment with various pizza styles and baking techniques.
Overall, the pizza oven is a critical piece of equipment in a pizzeria and can significantly impact the quality, taste, and efficiency of the pizzas you serve to your customers. It’s worth investing in a high-quality oven that suits your specific needs and pizza style. Let me know if you need more information on choosing the right oven for your pizza restaurant!
Choosing the right oven for your pizza shop
Since a pizza oven has the biggest impact on the quality of your pizza, choosing the right oven is crucial. There are some key considerations when choosing the right pizza oven for your pizzeria.
Oven type: Most pizza chains use a conveyor oven, but it is an option. All pizza ovens have pros and cons; you can choose each oven based on its features, size, and your expectations.
Available Space: Most oven types have different depth and deck options. For example, a deck oven has a deep cooking chamber that can accommodate at least three pizzas. Measuring the space where you want to place your oven will help choose the right size.
Budget: Budget is a decisive factor in choosing a pizza oven. Larger oven sizes are generally more expensive, and ovens with additional features may increase the cost. Gas ovens are generally cheaper but require a connection to a gas line.
Pizza oven types
Gas oven: At the same quality level, gas ovens are cheaper than electric ovens. But they also have some disadvantages. First, if you don’t have natural gas in your home, you’ll need a natural gas supply, which can be expensive. Gas ovens tend to suffer from hot spots and uneven heating.
Electric oven: Electric ovens are the most popular type. They are very easy to use and clean and are even perfect for cooking.
Deck Oven: Deck oven is a very popular type of oven used in pizzeria equipment. They produce high-quality pizza and pizza made with a brick-lined stone base similar to a brick oven. The deck oven has multiple cooking chambers and can accommodate at least 3 pizzas. They must be preheated for at least an hour and heated to 400 to 700 degrees Fahrenheit.
Convection Oven: Convection ovens are a great choice in environments where productivity is a top priority. Cooks each side of the pizza simultaneously by circulating hot air. It’s less work and cooks quickly; however, it can cook 1 or 2 pizzas at a time. One disadvantage of convection ovens is that they require a long recovery period, which is the time it takes for the oven to return to temperature after the oven door is opened.
Brick Oven: Brick pizza ovens are designed to cook pizza slowly and evenly and can be wood-fired or gas-fired. Although it takes forty-five minutes to preheat, the brick oven will eventually reach a temperature hot enough to cook a pie in 3 minutes and retain heat for a longer period of time. It can cook 10 to 12 pies at a time, making it a good choice for multi-client restaurants.
Conveyor Ovens: These units are very efficient pizzeria equipment with a temperature range of 400 to 600 degrees Fahrenheit and short cooking times. It cooks food by moving it through a heating chamber at a constant speed. Conveyor ovens can cook using either impinger or radiant heat. Impact conveyor ovens operate via fans that blow hot air, while radiant conveyor ovens have heating elements above and below the unit that also heat the oven walls, which produce radiant heat.
High-performance conveyor ovens don’t require as frequent inspections as deck ovens, so they allow your staff to focus on customer service and making high-quality pizza.
Portable Oven: With a lightweight portable pizza oven, you can cook pizza anytime, anywhere. A portable wood burning gas oven will suit your needs perfectly.
Countertop Ovens: You can save money and space by choosing countertop versions of countertop ovens, convection ovens, and conveyor ovens. While the number of pizzas a countertop oven can make per hour varies greatly depending on the oven type, they don’t cook as well as larger pizzas.
- 2. Dough mixer
Commercial dough mixers are pizzeria equipment specifically designed to continuously and thoroughly mix, knead, and stretch dense dough. Spiral mixers are designed specifically for kneading dough. Unlike planetary mixers, their hooks and bowls are fixed and not interchangeable, but the rotating bowl provides more even results. Planetary mixers can knead dough, mix and even combine ingredients. It differs from a spiral mixer in which the planetary attachments rotate in a stationary bowl, whereas in a spiral mixer the bowl rotates and the attachment remains stationary.
Blenders range in capacity from 15 pounds to over 300 pounds. They come with a mixing bowl and a range of containers and accessories. Therefore, you can accommodate and knead large quantities of ingredients at once.
- 3. Dough rounder and divider
To simplify and speed up the dough-making process, one of the main pieces of equipment in a pizza shop is a dough divider and rounder. It can divide and roll large amounts of dough in a short time, allowing you to use your time for other tasks.
- 4. Pizza preparation station
Refrigerated prep stations are used to easily prepare anything that uses refrigerated ingredients in the process. Your food is kept at a safe temperature, and all ingredients are easily accessible during preparation with the refrigerated open well and separate components. It also provides a flat surface for making pizza.
- 5. Warming cabinet/proofing cabinet
Proofing cabinets are made of aluminum or stainless steel and provide a more controlled environment to speed up the fermentation of dough. The warm atmosphere it creates causes the dough to ferment faster and rise faster.
- 6. Dough retarder
When you retard your dough, you can put it in a cooler to slow down the fermentation process. This process can be used for a number of different reasons. Some pizza makers will delay dough preparation until needed. Some delay the dough to enhance its flavor.
- 7. Pizza pan and pizza peel
A pizza peel is a pizza tool that you can use to put a pizza in and out of the oven without burning yourself. There are many types of pans that make different styles of pizza, so you should use different types depending on the type of pizza you want to serve. Using a thick pan will allow the pizza to cook longer.
- 8. Pizza dough press and dough roller
To get the perfect pizza dough, all you need is a pizza dough press and a dough roller. It will help you develop the thickness of the dough.
Pizzeria Equipment Maintenance
All pizza shop equipment can withstand heavy workloads and continuous work, but the longevity of your investment will depend on how it is used and maintained. If you want your investment to last, you should clean and maintain your pizza shop equipment regularly.
Pizza Oven: Spills or spots are normal when cooking in the oven. To extend the life of this pizza shop equipment, make sure you clean it regularly. Don’t forget to make sure your oven is cool before you start cleaning.
Dough mixer: To clean the spiral mixer, you can pour some hot water into the bowl and steam it by covering the bowl with a piece of plastic to soften the dough residue in the bowl. After steaming for about 15 minutes, you can use a nylon-bristle brush to wash the dishes. Then rinse and sterilize the bowl.
