The Recovery Calzone

At Ooni HQ, we make and eat pizza most days of the week. However, no matter how practised you are at making, stretching, topping and launching your pizza, there are times when it just doesn’t work out.

Maybe you’ve started topping your pizza and suddenly you realise there are holes in the base. Or, you’ve overstretched your dough and it ends up way too thin, and splits when you layer up your toppings. Maybe you might’ve forgotten to flour your peel before you laid out your pizza base and now it’s stuck and won’t slide off the peel into the oven.

No matter the scenario, please don’t fear – your pizza can still be salvaged!

This is where the Recovery Calzone comes in to save the day. This is a handy trick for when you don’t want your problem pizza to become a total fail. These steps will work for a pizza base that has a hole or holes on one side, but not all across the base.

 The Recovery Calzone

Step 1. Fold

1. If you’re starting with a pizza base that doesn’t have any sauce and/or toppings on top already, then add some sauce and ingredients to the half of the base with no holes or tears.

Be sure not to overtop it.

2. Then, fold the other side (the side with any holes or tears) over onto the other side, like closing a book.

If you’re starting with a pizza base that already has sauce and/or toppings on it, again just make sure that it’s the side with holes or tears that ends up on the top of the calzone.

3. Be sure to wipe away any sauce or ingredients that have ended up on the pizza peel, as these can make launching your pizza difficult as they’ll cause the dough to stick to the base.

Be sure to wipe away any sauce or ingredients that have ended up on the pizza peel, as these can make launching your pizza difficult as they’ll cause the dough to stick to the base.

Step 2. Pinch

1. Then, pinch together the edges of the dough so it’s sealed shut.

You want to twist the edges and roll the dough between your fingers as you move around the edge of the calzone to make sure the dough is really stuck together.

Step 3. Launch

1. Next, launch the calzone into your Ooni pizza oven, just like you would a regular pizza.

You can keep your Ooni at the same temperature as you normally would for cooking pizza, but be conscious that it may take a little longer to fully cook than a regular pizza. Remember to turn your calzone regularly so it cooks evenly on all sides.

2. Even though your dough is split or broken, it’ll still work just fine – we pull this trick all the time, and your pizza party guests will be none the wiser.