Pizza crust blah

[Foam Pants]

Actually, I bought a stone of a much higher quality and it only smelled of pottery when it heated up so I think I did right the second time around. The freebie is going to be passed on.

The second day was absolutely the best pizza I have ever made and probably eaten. The stone I bought was a huge rectangle, very thick. The crust turned out wonderfully crisp and I think the dough was the better for its extra day in the fridge. I took some pics. I'll post them when I find a hosting spot.

I chose very high flavor ingredients for these pizza batches which would give a lot of kick for little volume. I think it paid off. The crust was not weighed down and I still got a big flavor punch. I found out that bleu cheese is a great pizza ingredient. The whole wheat cake flour was excellent.

[Bill Klapp]

We have another pizza rant going on down on the Italy board. Feel free to visit!

[badthings]

I was flipping through the Rogers/Gray The Cafe Cookbook last night and they use a pizza dough they say is from Chez Panisse which incorporates some rye flour. I think this is another way to lower the gluten content of the dough with a different flavor than using cake flour.

That is the recipe I use. Rye is very low gluten (maybe none).

After reading Steingarten's article on pizza bianca, I got obsessive about crusts. Ordered 3 different flours from King Arthur, and forced all my friends to taste test many variations. The consensus was that the rye/all-purpose had the best flavor. Texture was more a matter of taste, but the rye/AP was very similar to pure 00, which is to say thin and cracker-y.

I never did make a satisfactory "NY-style" crust, but I may try again using some of these excellent suggestions. It's tough without a Kitchen Aid.

[John Braise]

I know this thread is dying out, but I thought I'd add in a couple of my experiences.

For a toothier, more bread-like crust, I think the higher gluten flours work best. AP, bread flour, or even bread machine flour. I've also tried some of Shirley Corriher's breadmaking tips from Cookwise, like adding in a bit of crushed vitamin C, a little soy flour, etc to stimulate yeast activity. That worked well, but I generally prefer the crunchier, lighter crusts.

To get a crunchier crust, a lot of tips have already been mentioned, but substituting half of the water with white wine works really well. Bloom the yeast in water, and then add any remaning water and heated wine to the flour (or sponge if you're so inclined). Using lower gluten flours works in your favor as well (or sub in half cake flour). Adding in a little (probably one part in 10 or less) semolina flour adds a nice flavor and also serves to crisp things up. Careful with the semolina, though, I've made crusts that could cut diamonds.

I'll reiterate that the dough should really be very wet. Unworkable without plenty of flour on your counter.

[vengroff]

Host's note: due to the age of this post, the images are no longer available.

 

I made grilled pizza for the first time yesterday. Purists will scoff at my use of a gas grill instead of a wood-fired one, but that's what I had to work with. Based on my research, I had several concerns: getting the grill hot enough; getting the dough onto the grill without mangling it; preventing the dough from sticking to the grill; and getting the cheese to melt. Fortunately, none of these proved to be a problem for me.

My dough was 3 cups AP flour, 1 cup semolina, 2T olive oil, 1t salt, and 1t active dry yeast mixed in 1c of 110 degree water. This was enough for two pizzas. I mixed and kneaded in my KitchenAid mixer, let it rise for an hour, then punched it down, stretched it out, and let it rest for 10 minutes while the grill heated up. Once it reached 500 degrees, I was ready to make pizza.

That's when the real fun began, as the following photos illustrate:

Here is the dough right before going on the grill.

I brushed the top with EVOO, then flipped it onto the grill, quickly brushed the other side as shown, and then closed the grill.

I lowered the burners directly under the pizza, but kept the ones on the other side on high, so as to keep the temperature at 450 but not scorch the crust. Five minutes later, it's time to flip

Then the toppings go on quickly and the lid is closed again. I stuck to the basic mozzerella, basil, and tomato.

Five minutes later the cheese has melted, the dough has baked through and developed a nice crisp exterior, and we are good to go.

Here is the finished product:

It turns out what I produced is sort of in the middle ground between pizza and focaccia. Whatever it was, it was good, and I will definitely be making it again. Next time I'll start exploring additional toppings.

Edited May 13, 2021 by Smithy
Added host's note (log)

[Jason Perlow]

Nice, Darren. But no marinara?

[vengroff]

Nice, Darren. But no marinara?

Next time I'll do a wider variety of toppings, marinara included. But before I did this experiment I had no idea if I'd end up with crust or charred cardboard, so I kept the toppings simple.

Candidate toppings include pre-sauteed mushrooms and onions, anchovies, tinned Italian tuna, capers, olives, prosciutto, fontina, goat cheese, and arugala (not all at the same time of course).

[slkinsey]

Very nice, Darren. Next time, don't be afraid to go thinner and darker with the crust. I think you probably could haver kept the burners under the pizza on high the whole time.

Great first results.

[formerly grueldelux]

My pizza method (from an old Usenet post):

7. A low-gluten flour will give an authentic crust that is more

  tender and pliable.  Use around 25% cake or pastry flour and

  75% all purpose flour to mimic Italian "OO" flour.  If you can

  get your hands on some genuine "OO" -- all the better.

I too have recently settled on a mixture of high gluten and pastry flours, with optional semolina and a longish ferment. Wondering, though, about 00 flour, which I never use. Are the 00 flours available in the US labelled as to protein content or suitability for bread making? I wonder because Jeffrey Steingartens's bit on Italian bread in It Must Have Been Something I Ate made me realize that I shared in what may be a widespread confusion: that 00 is both soft and low protein. It really just refers to how finely the flour is milled and not the protein content, which can vary widely within each grade.

[rcaffelle]

Definitely agree with slkinsey about thinner and darker. I grill pizza all the time and am currently using a Reinhart recipe for grilled pizza dough that uses 5 total cups of flour and makes a total of 6 pizzas close to the diameter of your pies. I also use a grill and have no problem grilling the first side with both burners on high for 15 minutes before starting. When I throw the dough on the grill, it even 'sags' a bit so you really see the impression of the grill grates coming through the dough, but it's easy enough to flip once it's cooked for a bit. By the time the toppings are on and cooking, the grill temp has died down enough to usually finish without burner adjustment. Definitely try the slow fermentation route, it's really easy to freeze a bunch of balls after making a big batch. Great pics! I love Reinhart's new American Pie for do-all pizza reference.

rich

[slkinsey]

My pizza method (from an old Usenet post):

7. A low-gluten flour will give an authentic crust that is more

  tender and pliable.  Use around 25% cake or pastry flour and

  75% all purpose flour to mimic Italian "OO" flour.  If you can

  get your hands on some genuine "OO" -- all the better.

I too have recently settled on a mixture of high gluten and pastry flours, with optional semolina and a longish ferment. Wondering, though, about 00 flour, which I never use. Are the 00 flours available in the US labelled as to protein content or suitability for bread making? I wonder because Jeffrey Steingartens's bit on Italian bread in It Must Have Been Something I Ate made me realize that I shared in what may be a widespread confusion: that 00 is both soft and low protein. It really just refers to how finely the flour is milled and not the protein content, which can vary widely within each grade.

Semolina and high gluten flour will definitely not give you an Italianate crust. This is not to say that it will be bad, but it won't be like they are in Italy.

00 flour doesn't necessarily refer to the protein content so much as it does the level of refinement (more refined than American unbleached AP). One can buy "tipo 00 per pizza" in Italy, and I have used it here. The resultant dough strikes me as somewhat weaker than an American AP dough, and definitely much weaker than a high gluten or semolina (aka strong duram flour) dough. In my experience, a pliable dough made with "00 for pizza" is too weak to be twirled or stretched in the air. Almost all the stretching of the dough happens on the bench. This accords with what I have observed in Italian pizzerie. As a result, I came up with the idea of using around 25% (highly refined and low in gluten) cake or pastry flour to mimic the "00 for pizza" dough and have been happy with the results.

With high gluten and semolina, you have to use fat to cut the dough and make it tender. With "00 for pizza" or the mixture I have described above, you get a tender crust without using fat in the dough. 100% AP with no fat is probably a good compromise for those who want a chewier dough.

[formerly grueldelux]

My pizza method (from an old Usenet post):

7. A low-gluten flour will give an authentic crust that is more

  tender and pliable.  Use around 25% cake or pastry flour and

  75% all purpose flour to mimic Italian "OO" flour.  If you can

  get your hands on some genuine "OO" -- all the better.

I too have recently settled on a mixture of high gluten and pastry flours, with optional semolina and a longish ferment. Wondering, though, about 00 flour, which I never use. Are the 00 flours available in the US labelled as to protein content or suitability for bread making? I wonder because Jeffrey Steingartens's bit on Italian bread in It Must Have Been Something I Ate made me realize that I shared in what may be a widespread confusion: that 00 is both soft and low protein. It really just refers to how finely the flour is milled and not the protein content, which can vary widely within each grade.

Semolina and high gluten flour will definitely not give you an Italianate crust. This is not to say that it will be bad, but it won't be like they are in Italy.

00 flour doesn't necessarily refer to the protein content so much as it does the level of refinement (more refined than American unbleached AP). One can buy "tipo 00 per pizza" in Italy, and I have used it here. The resultant dough strikes me as somewhat weaker than an American AP dough, and definitely much weaker than a high gluten or semolina (aka strong duram flour) dough. In my experience, a pliable dough made with "00 for pizza" is too weak to be twirled or stretched in the air. Almost all the stretching of the dough happens on the bench. This accords with what I have observed in Italian pizzerie. As a result, I came up with the idea of using around 25% (highly refined and low in gluten) cake or pastry flour to mimic the "00 for pizza" dough and have been happy with the results.

With high gluten and semolina, you have to use fat to cut the dough and make it tender. With "00 for pizza" or the mixture I have described above, you get a tender crust without using fat in the dough. 100% AP with no fat is probably a good compromise for those who want a chewier dough.

I've basically settled on something near John Thorne's proportions;

4 parts pastry flour

4 parts hi-gluten bread flour

1 part fine durum flour

no fat

With nearly 50% pastry flour it results in a dough that's definitely a little weak. So maybe the end results are close to your 75% a.p./25% pastry? Mr Thorne claims the resultant dough has all the strength of an a.p. flour dough but more character. I just know it delivers a dough that has a good wheaty taste and is both tender and crisp. In any case, it wasn't until I got a ceramic cooker and developed the patience to preheat it at 600-650 degrees for an hour that I got anything approaching a decent crust (mine cooking in 4 minutes, with good char.)

I plan to give your recipe a try and do a comparison.

-michael

[Chris Amirault]

Just wanted to let you bakers know that the eighth cook-off is pizza. We'd all appreciate your insights over there!!