DIY Pizza Peel

In this tutorial, I show you how to make a DIY Pizza Peel with a long handle with Mahogany and Walnut wood.

Tools I Used

Wood Species

First, it is important to choose a suitable hardwood for a DIY pizza peel.  Also, a wood pizza peel will come into contact with food and it will be exposed to excessive heat.  

Mahogany and Walnut seemed like a great choice for this DIY pizza peel. Essentially, they are both hardwoods and I had excess in my workshop.

Furthermore, I wanted the pizza peel to have a long handle and be about 14″ wide.  

The dimensions I used originated from the look and feel, not from exact dimensions.

Mill Wood

First, I resawed the 8×4 (2″ thick) piece of mahogany on my Grizzly table saw. 

Next, I cut 2 pieces of 4×4 (1″) walnut to 14″ on my Bosch Miter Saw.  These pieces were the sides of the DIY Pizza Peel.

Straight Sides

Also, a nice jointer is on my tool wish list.  

For the interim, I use my homemade jointer sled with 2 grooves I cut with a dovetail 14 degree router bit.  Essentially, my dovetail clamps secure the board to the sled to get one straight side.  

Then, I used my table saw to straighten the other side.  I repeated this procedure for all 3 boards.

Plane Wood

Next, I ran them through my dewalt planer.  The boards were already fairly flat, so a few passes achieved the desired result.

Glue Up

First, I placed the boards in their appropriate position to make sure they were flush.  I placed the boards on 2 bar clamps and flipped the pieces of walnut upwards.

Then, I used a glue dispenser to spread an even bead of glue on each piece of walnut.

Next, I used a rockler silicon glue applicator set to cover the entire area.  I slowly applied pressure with my bar clamps until glue seeped out evenly.  

The picture shows 2 bar clamps, but I used 4 bar clamps in total.

Draw Template

As I mentioned previously, I didn’t use a template for the wood pizza peel.  Instead, I used a pizza stone from my smoker.  

Next, I traced it with a double sided pencil.

I free-handed the neck of the wood pizza peel while ensuring it was even on both sides.  Ultimately, it was important to me to have a long handle.

Spray paint cans are very handy for drawing perfect circles.  So, I decided to use one to form the knob.

Finally, I cut out the lines using my bandsaw.

Rough Sanding

Sanding is an essential part of how to make a pizza peel.

First, I used my spindle sander with the wide spindle to knock down the rough spots on the wood pizza peel.

Next, I used my small spindle on my spindle sander to sand the pizza peel long handle and knob.

Then, I used my disc sander remove the marks caused by the spindle sander.

Finally, I finished off with my orbital sander.

Pizza Peel Long Handle Width

In order for this to be an authentic wood pizza peel, I needed to thicken the handle.

First, I resawed another piece of mahogany on my bandsaw to roughly 5/8″.

Next, I ran it through the planer to reduce the thickness to 1/2″ and get 2 flat sides.  In order to get 1 straight side, I used a piece of mdf as a reference to get and double-sided tape to to secure the mahogany.

Then, I put the piece of mahogany under my pizza peel and traced the shape of the long handle and knob.  I used my bandsaw to cut slightly outside the line.

Once the mahogany was cut out, I placed it on top of the pizza peel and sketched the half moon the same circumference as the circle.  I cut this out on the bandsaw.

Next, I used wood glue and my wood glue dispenser to spread glue evenly on the piece.  I clamped it down with F clamps and let it dry for a few hours.

Finally, I used my belt sander to create a smooth transition from the pizza peel long handle to the wood pizza peel.  I smoothed the edges on the spindle sander with the small spindle.

Pizza Peel Lip

Another essential wood pizza peel quality is a indented lip.  This helps the pizza peel slide under the pizza when removing it from the pizza oven or grill.

First, I used my trim router with a 1/2″ roundover bit and table saw router table to roundover the top of the pizza peel and both sides of the pizza peel long handle.  I didn’t round over the bottom of the round part of the pizza peel because I want this to sit flat.

I used my pencil to draw a horizontal line across the middle of the pizza peel.

Next, I used one finger as a guide and traced a line about 1″ from the edge of the pizza peel.  This line will start the downward slant to the end of the pizza peel.  I used my belt sander to sand from the line to the edge of the pizza peel.

Pizza Peel Knob

In order for the pizza peel to hang from the wall, I drilled a hole in the knob.  I used my drill press with a 1/2″ forstner bit to accomplish this.  Be sure to put a scrap piece of wood below to prevent tear out.

To add a bit of flare, I took a leather string I found in my shop and tied it through the hole.  I’m not sure why I did this – it just seemed like it needed a leather cord.  :)

Apply Finish

Before I applied the finish, I used a tack cloth to remove the loose dust.

Next, I used mineral oil as my finish.  I applied the 3 coats and lightly sanded with 220 grit paper in between coats.

Finally, used a combination of beeswax and boiled linseed oil on the final coat.  I wiped it down with a lint free cloth and I was done.

Conclusion

In conclusion, I hope you learned how to make a DIY Pizza Peel.