Ask Paul: How High Can I Turn My Oven?

Question: I run my pizza oven extremely hot, sometimes as high as 900°F. Can your pans withstand that hot of an oven?

The short answer: Yes. The long answer is a bit more complicated. Most baking pans in the marketplace can withstand temperatures as high as 700°F. However, that’s an empty pan with nothing on it. When you add food to the pan, our pans can withstand significantly higher temperatures, up to 900°F.

Why is this?

Most foods are largely water, which won’t get over 212°F. You’d have to boil the food dry to get it any higher. The only exception to this is the contact surface where the food meets the pan. Even here, you’re not going to see temperatures above 250°F to 300°F. Beyond that and the product will dry and start over browning.

So why can I set my oven temperatures as hot as 900°F?

Oven or emitter temperatures are often higher than the food or pan temperature. The heat absorption of an oven into a food is not 100%, so the oven has to be set higher to attain the results of a perfectly baked pizza or other food item.

Rarely do the pans get over 350°F in indirect heating used in typical impinger and speed cook ovens. Even in applications where a char is desired on a pizza crust, the actual temperature of the pan is rarely going to exceed 500°F. Our pans will even hold up if you’re cooking at 900°F on stone hearth ovens as long as you take the pan out when the food’s cooked.

Have a question for Paul, leave a comment or email us at sales@lloydpans.com