OK, I know this sounds like an insane idea, We love pizza! This solution was so simple, cheap and utterly a joke when my husband and I first came up with it many years ago before the idea of marriage, or new kitchen was even born yet. I went to the local home store. Purchased a dozen unglazed eight inch floor tiles. Put them on the oven rack. Preheat while prepping. The tiles were less than a dollar a piece. I don't have to wash them because the heat from the oven turns any residue to ash. Just brush with a dustpan brush (only for the oven) when the tiles are cold. If I'm doing a turkey or baking, I just remove the tiles & put them back in if we're doing pizza. The bottom crust is so perfect! Preheat to 500F then turn it back to 450F when the pie goes in.

So I took the drive to SLT and was disappointed to see that their steel is 14x14 rather than a more standard 14x16. I already don't like the 14" dimension on my stone (although I realize it's about as deep as reasonably fits in a residential oven) but I wasn't willing to sacrifice the width. I should have looked it up online first instead of assuming it would be a standard size. While there I doublechecked at bakingsteel, yes theirs are 14x16 and I and saw that for $20 more they have one that's 3/8" thick rather than 1/4". Might just go for that one for the heck of it, I find there's a distinct difference that I prefer between pizzas I've cooked on a stone as opposed to a pan, and I hope I'll see added improvement with a steel.

Our New Years' Eve party is always a game night. The main group of contestants, our anointed Scrabble Masters, battle it out around the dining table, thrusting and parrying with their Official Dictionaries. The local Monopolists exploit each other at the living room game table. Sorry boys, but only one of you will end up as the 1%. The chatterers and gigglers gather around the fireplace and the sideboard-turned-bar. A hard core of our older guy friends loiter in my kitchen, drinking scotch and sampling the production of noshes and nibbles. Our Quality Assurance team, I suppose. People start arriving around 7 pm. At midnight there are poppers and honkers, party hats and industrial-size sparklers. We play "Auld Lang Syne" (Jimi Hendrix, Fillmore East 1970) extra loud. Injuries are tended to (those sparklers looked like welding torches), the hardest-core gamers get back to their tables, coffee is served. The last guest typically leaves around 2 am. We try to keep people supplied with food this whole time, lest they revolt and burn down our house with a sparkler. What to serve for this situation? There are usually a couple trays of SWMBO's holiday almond roca and peanut brittle. As it is in part a neighborhood gathering, several dishes always get walked over, this year some yummy bacon cheese wraps and deviled eggs. I made some BBQ buffalo wings. SWMBO made an artichoke dip and her gorgonzola garlic cheesecake. All fine and well, but after sitting out for three hours, those initial dishes aren't so appetizing. Let's not even mention what ceviche looks like after a couple hours on display. That need for continuing food is where the pizza worked nicely. All the real pizza work was done ahead. The dough, the sauce, the slicing and dicing and mincing and sprinkling. When guests started arriving, the oven was pre-heated. About an hour into the evening, I finished off my second Caipirinha and started making mini-pizzas. It was a leisurely process. Stretch out a small rectangular crust, top, slide into oven. Wander around, kibitz at the game tables, refresh my drink, cut and serve the pizza, make another pizza, repeat. My first-effort pizzas were nothing to write home about. But they were eaten all the same. We had pepperoni and mushroom pizza, olives and onion pizza, clams and olives pizza, crabmeat and scallops pizza, and for Miss Vegetarian, who wasn't wearing a turban tonight, roast brussels sprouts and egg white pizza. I ended up not making a bunch of other stuff. About halfway through the afternoon prep, the weight of three weeks' non-stop house guests, too many holiday dinner parties, too much in-law time, and work that never let up until the last couple days of the year - it all came down. I suddenly got really tired, slumping tired, aching feet tired. So all the fun and frivolous dishes got thrown overboard. I have a refrigerator full of those fixins' that I've got to repurpose over the next few days. (What to do with a dozen oysters, a dozen frozen egg yolks, chicken strips marinated in sugar, etc?) I did have fun during the party, but it was also a little bit about survival. I drank a quart of water for every cocktail. Ate mostly microwaved egg whites. Snuck upstairs for a couple of 5 minute lay downs. And now it is the New Year. I don't have a crystal ball, but I know one thing about the coming year. There's not going to be any damned dinner parties or house guests for at least a month!

Update on the Panasonic Convection/MW: I cooked stuffed peppers last night and decided to preheat the oven. I combo cooked for 25 min total but it took a little longer to get everything put together so it was preheating for a while before that. When my daughter got something out of the cabinet above she commented that it was warm and it definitely was. I got out the manual (which has a picture of the oven on a counter below wall cabinets) and under placement of oven it says "3" clearance on each side and 1" on top, do not block air vents, do not place near a hot, damp, surface such as a gas or electric range or dishwasher, do not operate when room humidity is excessive." Also, I couldn't find it on display anywhere when I was looking. They have it online at Sears and Best Buy but not in the stores and none of the 4 appliances stores that I went to had one either. I ended up buying it sight unseen at Buy.com . So far I like it better than the Sharp. Hope that helps! attention. I did notice the cabinet being warm on occasion but never checked during or right after cooking. I cooked the stuffed peppers for 25 minutes total but it took me longer than expected to get everything put together so it was preheating for a while. I know that doesn't help much but I thought I'd throw that in. Also, FWIW, when I took down the wallpaper in the kitchen several weeks ago, the paper behind that oven had come away from the wall. I read about the Panasonic here on Gardenweb. It seems stupid to have a countertop oven that size that nees 6" clearance above it month, teh paper beThere's about