Pizza Dough

[paulraphael]

If anyone wants to be a guinea pig, I've been curious to know how that releasable foil would work in place of parchment ... especially if could be re-used for more than one pie.

[Blether]

ok... so I need help... what am I doing wrong?

... On the day of baking, I put a large terracotta saucer upside down in my cold oven - then set the temp of my oven to about 250 to gently preheat the stone... then cranked the heat to 500-550F and let it sit for over an hour....  My oven thermometer which has a max of 500 was reading way off the scale...

... the outside of the crust was hard like a crusty breadstick, while the inside was soft-ish...  Baking time was approx. 7 minutes....

What did I do wrong?  Help!!!!!

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To me, it sounds like you baked it too hot and/or too long. I use a similar approach for the dough, very little topping (a tbsp or two of tomato sauce) and find 7-8 mins is just right at 250C.

As for the parchment trick, I typically make a personal-size pizza, about 10". I proof / retard the dough in an oiled plastic bag. When the time comes to form it, I open the bag and place the dough-in-the-bag on my left hand, and sprinkle *lots* of flour over the top of the doughball. I reach in with that floury right hand and flip the (floury side of the) dough ball on to it, and draw hand and dough out of the bag. the top (as-yet-unfloured) side of the dough then gets its generous flouring. At that point the dough is totally handle-able, and I just shape while moving from hand to hand.

I can see how parchment might help for a bigger pizza. I do in fact use parchment to bake on, only the pizza is formed before I lay it on the parchment.

Edited August 28, 2009 by Blether (log)

[qrn]

I take my dough from freezer and let thaw and rise,(as described in above post) 5 hours or so. then flour counter and cut bag from it(it was already in the basic shape , albiet thicker, in the bag..Then by hand form it to about a 13or14 inch size on the granite counter.

then put a very light layer of corn meal on the wooden pizza paddle...put the finished dough on it, and shake it a bit to make sure its not stuck, Make up the pie and then shake it again, several times, to make sure its not stuck,,,The shake is a very small, quick shake to keep it loose...

before going in the oven push a small ridge around the outside edge to keep stuff from melting off the edge, and making a mess..spray the edge with a bit of olive oil so it will brown.. then off to the 14" steel plate that has been pre heated on the bottom rack and is about 700º (in a 550º oven).

it takes the very quick, small shake to to keep the pie "floating" on the corn meal when you put it on the steel,, I use such a small amount of meal that it does not get all over the oven and make a mess...

Bud

[Kent Wang]

How do you calculate hydration percentage? Is it by volume or weight?

[Moopheus]

My first couple of tries at pizza were very mixed results. The first time I used the procedure outlined in Silver Spoon, managed to actually make a pizza, but it was very difficult to form the crust. The second time, I used a different recipe, and had results like KennethT's--I made goop, not dough. Also, like KennethT, I was using Italian tipo 00 pizza flour, not a high-gluten bread or AP flour. Now I'm not sure what to do with this. Less hydration? Longer fermenting? I've done a lot of dessert baking, but not so much bread baking, so I could use some advice.

[vice]

How do you calculate hydration percentage? Is it by volume or weight?

Weight - for a dough that is 70% hydrated, it's 700 g water to 1000 g flour.

[paulraphael]

As for the parchment trick, I typically make a personal-size pizza, about 10". I proof / retard the dough in an oiled plastic bag. When the time comes to form it, I open the bag and place the dough-in-the-bag on my left hand, and sprinkle *lots* of flour over the top of the doughball. I reach in with that floury right hand and flip the (floury side of the) dough ball on to it, and draw hand and dough out of the bag. the top (as-yet-unfloured) side of the dough then gets its generous flouring. At that point the dough is totally handle-able, and I just shape while moving from hand to hand.

I can see how parchment might help for a bigger pizza. I do in fact use parchment to bake on, only the pizza is formed before I lay it on the parchment.

If you shape the dough and build the pizza on parchment, you don't need to use all that added flour, because the dough won't have to be handled and won't have to slide. You'll be able use higher hydration with less trouble ... or if you have a super hot oven and don't need such high hydration, you won't risk the bitter tastes that come from bench flour overcooking.

parchment's hardly essential ... I consider it a cheat. But I'm not a ninja when it comes to handling gluey dough, and the cheat improves both my success rate and my mood.

[stuartlikesstrudel]

Can someone give me some guidelines as to what expect from a long-retardation Napoli style dough? I made paulraphael's recipe and cooked it after 3 days in the fridge. I liked it, but I don't know if I got it right, and it wasn't my ideal dough.

First caveat is that my oven wasn't cranking as hot as it should have, and I didn't have a pizza stone (or even prewarmed baking trays).

The edges of the crust ended up crispy and golden on the outside and a bit chewy inside i guess, i liked this aspect quite a lot. The rest of the pizza was a bit "eh". The underside was quite pale (probably due to the lack of warmed tray or stone) and if I picked up a slice straight after the oven, it would droop. After a minute or two it was a bit firmer, so it wasn't SOGGY or anything but not very similar to take-away pizza (which I am just using as a comparison, I definitely don't see as the benchmark!).

I reckon I got less than 25% rise/oven spring, is this what you would expect, particularly with the toppings on it?

I should have taken a photo so I could get some better analysis... I guess I'm just trying to work out if I did anything noticeably wrong or I just wasn't expecting quite the right thing. I will try it again for sure, particularly with a stone and a super hot oven.

[Blether]

... what expect from a long-retardation Napoli style dough?

As I make it, this shows the amount of rise to look for and the appearance of the dough when ready. Does it look like what you achieved ?

[paulraphael]

The edges of the crust ended up crispy and golden on the outside and a bit chewy inside i guess, i liked this aspect quite a lot. The rest of the pizza was a bit "eh". The underside was quite pale (probably due to the lack of warmed tray or stone) and if I picked up a slice straight after the oven, it would droop. After a minute or two it was a bit firmer, so it wasn't SOGGY or anything but not very similar to take-away pizza (which I am just using as a comparison, I definitely don't see as the benchmark!).

Just sounds underbaked to me. If the top was cooked properly and the crust wasn't, then (as you suggested) you need to have the dough on a much hotter surface. People seem to do well with a stone, quarry tiles, or slab of metal right down over the firebox of the oven, where it can be blazing hot compared with the top of the oven.

You should get some char on the bottom, or at least some deep browning. If the oven is hot enough you'll achieve this without turning the crust into a giant cracker. There should be a lot of rise ... generally if I don't stretch the dough out to well under 1/4" thick, it poofs up more than I like.

Oven temp / stone temp is probably the first variable to play with. There are a million others ... pizza takes a lot of practice. If you're working from my recipe, I'd encourage you to think of it as a template. The method described is a basic one, and a good one. The exact proportions of ingredients, the hydration, oven temperature, etc.. can be monkeyed with to suit your tastes.

Edited November 11, 2009 by paulraphael (log)

[Raoul Duke]

After you work out the proper dough you'll need this. An 850 degree surface just gets it done.

[scott123]

After you work out the proper dough you'll need this. An 850 degree surface just gets it done.

Seriously, if someone were to possess the necessary wealth to build something like that, they might as well go the whole hog and build a roof over it so they can bake in the rain.

[stuartlikesstrudel]

*sigh* Raoul, don't get me started! After I started breadmaking I read one or two articles on building a wood fired oven, but had to quickly shut myself down before I got too keen on the idea, haha.

Thanks heaps for the comments, paul and blether.

Blether, my dough definitely didn't end up anything like that, I wouldn't have described it as very bread-like. I suspect that among other things, I underproved it.

Paul, thanks for confirming

Our oven can get decently hot so the potential is there, I was just running short on time and couldn't let it heat up enough.

The 1/4inch suggestion is a good one too, i'll keep it in mind.

And I know what you mean about variables! I have been doing occasional breadmaking for a few years now and still find it difficult to pinpoint one particular thing when I make a loaf... need a lot of experience to really know what to look for, how to modify, etc.

But even the less-good efforts are tasty and rewarding, so it's a good ride!

[Blether]

Blether, my dough definitely didn't end up anything like that, I wouldn't have described it as very bread-like. I suspect that among other things, I underproved it.

Yes, it needs some confidence to let the dough rise, then rise some more, and when it seems insupportable and likely to collapse at any moment, to give it quite a bit longer still. The same dough does make good Napoli-style pizza - the texture turns out quite different, because of (for pizza) shaping the dough after the rise, the thin, flat shape, and the short, hot baking.

[Raoul Duke]

Scott123. Didn't cost a lot since the wife and I spent 8 months building it ourselves. If most people would take the initiative to give it a shot they could enjoy the fruits of their labor, as well. We have always done it ourselves, self tutoring and observing. Just step out there and try it.

[scott123]

Scott123. Didn't cost a lot since the wife and I spent 8 months building it ourselves. If most people would take the initiative to give it a shot they could enjoy the fruits of their labor, as well. We have always done it ourselves, self tutoring and observing. Just step out there and try it.

You and your wife built that oven yourself?! Whoah. That's some nice work. You're not a mason? The stones couldn't have been cheap, right? You didn't have all those just 'lying' around?

As far as 'stepping out' and trying it myself, believe me, if I had that much level property, I'd build an oven in a heartbeat. As it is, 95% of my back yard is on a hill, and carving a plateau out of it is going to be a big project. Even if I could rent the necessary equipment, the only area that I could dig in is up a flight of stairs and the prospect of carrying pizzas up and down stairs doesn't sound too appealing.

Although not the same thing, I've got a 1 1/4" x 17" x 21" soapstone slab on my bottom oven shelf, that, when preheated to 600, does a pretty comparable job. If you can do a pizza in 3 minutes, I can do one in about 6. Not quite as much oven spring (and much longer recovery time between pies), but still better than any of the local pizzerias, which, imo, all put out some of the best commercial pizza in the world.

So I'm happy. Not brick oven happy, but happy none the less

[stuartlikesstrudel]

Just a quick update for anyone who's interested...

I haven't had a chance to repeat the long-rise doughs discussed here, but I did have to make some dough quickly (in a morning) for an event, so it had a total of about 3 hours to rise.

But I did get to use the pizza stones this time, and a much hotter oven, and the results are already a LOT better! The base had a much more satisfying crispness to it, and the cooking was much more even. So I'm excited about trying it with the good doughs

Fun times!

[Moopheus]

I am making some progress. With a little digging on the intertubes, I was able to figure out what sort of flour I had (Caputo pizza flour), find a good recipe for it, and make some manageable dough. In fact, the dough itself seemed to come out well and I was able to form nice dough balls. I decided to make two small pizzas and use parchment (I have a metal paddle). I think I made a mistake in that I decided to parbake the dough, and then put the toppings on. When I served the pizza, the bottom of the crust was hard (but not charred or even much browned) and the top was a bit soggy and underbaked. Also, I wasn't able to get the crust as evenly thin as I would like--there were spots that were too thick and some too thin. So I still have some work to do there.

[qrn]

One comment about stones...The heat transfer of a stone is much less than steel. I have several stones and only use em for bread.

For Pizza I use the steel plate, because the heat transfer of heat out of the steel,into the dough is much greater, than out of a stone. (both being the same temp).. somewhere there is a website that lists various materials heat transfer values but I don't remember where it is...but steel is much greater than stone.. and makes for a much crisper crust..

Bud

[Kent Wang]

I often read comments saying that a certain pizzeria's dough is more flavorful than another. How is this possible? The only acceptable seasoning seems to be salt, and presumably not very much of it.

[dougal]

I often read comments saying that a certain pizzeria's dough is more flavorful than another. How is this possible? The only acceptable seasoning seems to be salt, and presumably not very much of it.

Yeast or sourdough (natural yeast culture). And what sourdough. And what yeast. (If you want a taste of yeast, use active dry ...)

Fermentation time and temperature. Long time low temperature, more flavour.

Choice of flour, milling and flour content - about 1% rye flour brings out a lot of good flavours. Presence of wheatgerm, or not. Even French 'traditional' bread flour has a couple of percent bean flour and a bit of maize IIRC ...

And of course the oven conditions will also influence the amount of flavours developed by Maillard, caramelisation, charring...

Plenty of scope for variation!

Edited June 10, 2010 by dougal (log)

[paulraphael]

With naturally fermented doughs, the acids produced by the bacteria add a lot of flavor. With any dough that gets a long fermentation (a whole day or more) enzyme activity in the flour develops flavors. It's the same principles as with artisinal bread ... coaxing as much flavor out of the wheat as possible.

Edited June 10, 2010 by paulraphael (log)

[Crouton]

Scott123. Didn't cost a lot since the wife and I spent 8 months building it ourselves. If most people would take the initiative to give it a shot they could enjoy the fruits of their labor, as well. We have always done it ourselves, self tutoring and observing. Just step out there and try it.

That looks fantastic! If you don't mind me asking... where did you get the designs/plans to build that outdoor kitchen? Any specific DIY books/videos you can recommend? I've been itching to get started on a project like that. Also, if you don't mind me asking, what was the total cost of the materials, not including self-labor.

Edited June 16, 2010 by Crouton (log)

[jsmeeker]

I want to make some pizza over the weekend and need so make some dough. I have some "go to" recipes, but I am planning on trying out a different one this time. Poking around in my bookmarks, I found I had set one to a Peter Reinhart blog. I took a look and decided to make the "NY Style Pizza Dough" You can find a link to the recipe right here.

http://www.fornobravo.com/pizzaquest/instructionals/59-written-recipes.html

I'm going to make the dough tonight and park it in the fridge and bake a pizza with it tomorrow night for dinner. It will make enough dough for several small pies. I'll get going on it and report back.

[Blether]

Cool. I'll be interested to see how it goes. (Funny how he says "golden brown" but in the pictures the edge is all burned, eh ? But don't tell anyone I said so ).