J. Kenji López-Alt's Genius Guitar Mount Hack For Storing All Your Pizza Peels

Making homemade pizza comes with many perks. You can have fresh pizza whenever you want, you have full control of the ingredients that go in it, and the quality is superior to the frozen kind. If you take your tomato pie seriously, it probably means you own at least a couple of different pizza peels that vary in material or size. But while these are useful for transferring dough to a pizza stone and removing it from the oven, the problem is that they're not the easiest to store once you're done using them. 

Many are large or have a long handle, making them awkward to store or even fit in a drawer. There are special pizza peel shelves and racks that you can buy, but they tend to be expensive. An equally effective and much more reasonably priced solution, which we discovered thanks to J. Kenji López-Alt over at Serious Eats, is to use a guitar mount. This device, not to be confused with a guitar stand, is something you normally install on your wall to hang an instrument. However, a guitar mount also works surprisingly well at storing pizza peels conveniently without taking up any drawer or counter space.

A guitar mount works somewhat like a hanger or hook, with arms that secure the neck of your guitar so it doesn't fall. It'll work the same way with a pizza peel, but instead of the neck of the guitar, it'll hold the handle part of this kitchen tool. You can attach the guitar mount to any wall in your kitchen or even the inside of a cabinet door, but it might be a good idea to pick a spot that's near your oven. This will make your pizza peels easily accessible when you're making your next tomato pie.

If you plan to hang up a wooden pizza peel, avoid putting your guitar mount somewhere that gets a lot of moisture, like by the dishwasher. Wooden versions, much like wooden cutting boards, warp due to moisture. This typically happens after you wash it and don't dry it, but any moisture isn't very good for this cooking tool. That's also what makes guitar mounts so beneficial for pizza peels — they maximize airflow since they're positioned vertically.

When you look for a guitar mount, avoid the ones with wooden arms and instead look for adjustable versions. Being able to adjust a guitar mount is important because they aren't designed for the pizza peel handles which are usually skinnier. Luckily, there are plenty of mounts on the market.

Before buying, make sure to also check the weight allowance of the guitar mount. The more pizza peels you plan to store, the heavier they will be, especially if you have large ones. These types of mounts are typically meant for guitars which range from two to 12 pounds. Thankfully, you can find versions that work for a pizza peel at any music store, but there are also many options through online retailers such as Amazon. 

While it may seem unusual at first, it's worth investing in if you have pizza peels and need a better way to organize them.