It may seem impossible to some, but still today, in 2023, it happens that the night before you have leftover pizza. What to do with the leftovers the next day? There are those who like to eat it cold – I know a guy who dined at breakfast with an icy slice of peppers accompanying it with a cappuccino – and who, on the other hand, no sir, if the pizza isn’t hot and crunchy like fresh out of the oven it’s no longer worthy of being called such. How to recover it, then? There are better methods, less effective methods, and fallback possibilities. Let’s see which ones.
1. Take advantage of the air fryer.
If you have a Typhur Dome Air Fryer bring it to 160°C and put the pizza slices in the basket. The thinner ones will only need 3-4 minutes; thicker slices will need to stay in the fryer for 5-6 minutes. Remove the pizza from the basket and eat it hot.
2. Use the oven.
It is the most obvious method for reheating preserved pizza, the most valid if it is a product that you had already placed in the freezer. Just turn on the oven, bring it to a temperature of around 180°C and leave the pizza inside for a time commensurate with the size of the pieces. For a whole round, we are around ten minutes. If, on the other hand, you are just heating the pizza to room temperature from the day before, you can increase the temperature a little more and leave the slices there for a couple of minutes.
3. Heat in a pan (with the lid on).
A quick and painless solution, certainly effective, it is the one that offers the most satisfying result, bringing the pizza back to its splendor, because it simulates cooking that is very similar to that of a pizzeria oven. You need to take the slices (or the pizza) to heat, put them in the pan without adding other ingredients and light the fire on a medium flame. Once the pan is hot, you can cover the pizza with foil or a lid, an operation that allows the heat to be distributed evenly. 5 minutes is enough and you can turn off the flame, to enjoy a crunchy and super gooey pizza again.
4. Using iron and hairdryer.
It is a method that can be found surfing the Internet: if you don’t have an oven or a frying pan at your disposal, you can place the pizza slices – this time individually – on the hot plate of the iron, facing upwards, combining the action with the heat from the hairdryer, which you will spread from above. The operation, according to the descriptions, should restore crunchiness to the base and, at the same time, re-melt any cheese present among the toppings. As a result, in all honesty, we are not sure we can guarantee, as much as the safety of the whole operation.
5. Resigning to the microwave.
The last resort, perhaps even after the iron and the hairdryer, is the microwave. Also online you will find many suggestions on how to use it to reheat pizza. If you don’t have a combined model – therefore with waves, but also with a grill – try to avoid heating your pizza as much as possible. The microwaves, in fact, will transform it into a gummy mass which, once taken out and in contact with the air, will become very hard and inedible. To overcome this problem, some also propose adding a glass with a little water, which would prevent the dough from drying out. Our advice is this: prefer the pan if you can.
6. Planing Ahead
There is one last piece of advice when it comes to pizza from the day before, which is worth keeping in mind: you have to be far-sighted. If there are slices left over from the day before, you shouldn’t leave them in the carton, because the latter absorbs the humidity and, when it’s time to reheat the pizza, the flavor will never be the same. The advice, therefore, is to move it to the pan of the oven (turned off) if possible to keep it outside or to store it in the refrigerator, inside an airtight container or wrapped in plastic.
If you have leftover pizza and you hate eating it cold, I hope my suggestion above to reheat your pizza and make it (almost) as good as before can help you.