Pizza Dough: Tips, Troubleshooting, Storage

[markf424]

I have been able to successfully make pizza dough for a good, authentic Napoli crust - crispy and charred on the bottom and fairly crunchy throughout. I haven't been able to duplicate a Northeast (Philly/NYC) style pizzeria crust, however. I usually use 2 1/2 cups of bread flour with 1/2 to 1 cup of all-purpose nonbleached flour, 1 cup water with salt, 2-3 tablespoons olive oil, and proofed yeast.

Does anyone know the solution to getting that chewier crust?

-Mark

[Bicycle Lee]

Try malt flour as well as all-purpose....

[essvee]

Try not using bread flour, just regular old.

[essvee]

Or conversely, try using all bread flour. And always let your dough proof for a long time in the fridge, all pizza joints do that.

[markf424]

Yeah, I've tried all bread or all all-purpose. I didn't realize they let it rise in the fridge. That must take forever. I never feel like I get a great rise out of my dough, actually. It barely doubles in size. I saw Mario Batali do it once with brewer's yeast instead of active dry and the dough practically filled up the kitchen.

[bushey]

I make my pizza dough in the morning and let it rise all day in the fridge while I'm at work. I also try to keep it on the moist side, so it's still a little sticky -- I find that gives me a better texture. Depending on my mood, I might substitute a little whole wheat pastry flour for unbleached all-purpose flour. Imparts a slightly sweet, nutty flavor without making the texture coarse.

Used to use tiles for baking the pizza, but now I use pizza screens on the lower rack of a pre-heated HOT oven.

[markf424]

I'll definitely give that a whirl next time around. I use a baking stone for mine in a hot oven or even better, a hot gas grill. With the grill, you lose some of the overhead radiation but still get great convection so I keep the temperature around 550 degrees with the lid closed the entire time. You might want to give that a try.

[phaelon56]

I posted on this awhile back. There were several issues raised about what affects the texture and how a real NYC style chewy yet thin crust can be achieved. Using a bread mixer/dough hook appears to be a significant factor as well as the raising time. I found that adding a certain percentage of pure semolina flour adds something to the texture that gets the dough closer to the ballpark. Since the original thread was posted I have not had time to return to the kitchen and try the additional suggestions but for what i'ts worth..... here they are

Pizza Dough Thread

Edited September 11, 2003 by phaelon56 (log)

[gabe]

Try using high-gluten flour if you can find it and knead the dickens out of it before letting it rise. It's good to keep it on the sticky side, too -- not too much flour. I usually prebake my crusts for a minute or two before pulling them out and topping them -- this seems to avoid the sticky-middle syndrome which can sometimes happen with a moister, chewier crust. I use 500-550 degrees and preheat my stone for at least 1/2 hour.

edit: clarification

Edited September 11, 2003 by gabe (log)

[markf424]

Thanks for the thread link - exactly what I was looking for. I'll give these a shot - nothing like homemade pizza for an awesome weekend lunch.

[megaira]

So many pizza threads...

I make pizza regularily, we never get sick of it. My first pizzas were horrific, I thought there was no way I could get pizzaria pizza at home. Current opinion: that's horsepucky.

The best dough to *my tastes* I have yet to come across is also the most simple: flour, salt, yeast, water + time in the fridge. I make it in the food processor, it's blended for 45 seconds and retarded for 3-24 hours. You can find it in The Best Bread Ever cookbook. It's the basic french bread dough, not the pizza dough recipe. With practice, you'll figure out the right bread to water ratio (I have to adjust being at higher altitude) that works best for you. I mix bread flours (whatever's on sale) and there's a bag of King Arthur all purpose mixed in with about 15 pounds or so of the bread flour. Can't hurt.

This dough comes out crispy on the bottom, chewy on the top, plenty of flavor ...brushed with olive oil, the crust is tasty on it's own. It is what I think of when I think of classic pizzaria pizza crust.

Julia Child's French Bread dough also works out well when I don't have the extra time for the Best Bread - I'll sub a tbsp of cornmeal for the wheat flour once and a while or leave out the wheat flour all together. You could sub semolina for the wheat flour if you wanted, I'm sure.

Another hearty recommendation for the pizza stone. Your best bet for the crispy chewy crust is to stretch the dough thin and cook directly on the stone. I don't think, no matter what you do, you'll get the results you want without one.

When using the stone, it takes practice, so be patient and don't overtop the pizza - thicker crust for more toppings, thinner crust for less... if you overtop it, the toppings will jar loose when you slide the pizza onto the stone (most home ovens being low to the ground)...they'll slide right off a thin crust when you try to eat it and, worst of all, make it soggy.

You can skip some of this hassle by using a pizza screen and cooking your pizzas on the screen on the stone. I use mine constantly, though, I like the floury "crisp" I get from direct stone baking and prefer it.

The screen allows you to stretch the pizza as thin as you have room for (a floured peel will cause the dough to shrink up a little and large pizzas are harder to handle, so it's not always a practical choice). I've stretched some crusts so thin you could see through them when they were cooked. That's a bit overkill in my books...I like crispy bottom, chewy top, thin 1/8" - 1/4".

One thing, and I'm sure it was mentioned elsewhere, but it bears repeating...pizza dough does not suffer in anyway from being neglected. Start shaping and it's resistant? Just cover it up and walk away... clean the kitchen for 5-10 minutes, then come back. The gluten will have relaxed enough that it'll stretch out easily. If it starts to resist again, cover & walk away again. Don't try to force it or you'll just end up frustrated and lose texture in the crust you want.

Hand stretch, don't roll out with a rolling pin. You miss out on texture when you roll dough.

When you're using the stone -always preheat it in the oven (crank the dial all the way as far as you can go) and use the peel, don't put the stone in the oven with the pizza on it or you could crack and break the stone. That and, your pizza time will go from 7 minutes to 15-20. blech. If you're using flour or cornmeal on the stone, have something handy to brush the exess off the stone between pizzas. Burning flour isn't a nice smell...burning cornmeal smells horrendous.

Expect to have to use a lot of practice, expect to tinker with different sauces until you find one you like (took me at least a year to find one I really liked)... try out different cheeses, but remember to take into account water and fat content of cheeses combined with toppings and sauce...swiss or chedder (not my favorite anyway) will leave you with a nice pool of fat on top. Whole milk mozzerella is wonderful, but the high water content (as someone mentioned in another thread) will leave you with a puddle as well, so either drain it, or use sparingly and not in conjunction with a real wet sauce. It's actually pretty good on a crust that's just had a light brushing of olive oil -it's often wet enough to make it's own sauce of sorts.

Vegetables - some vegetables have higher water contents. I generally don't have a problem with them unless I go overboard, or, I do a deep dish pizza. Onions and green peppers are usually the biggest culprits, just be aware when using them they can sog things up on you. mushrooms sliced large as well... smaller dice does not seem to present such a problem.

I could probably write out a book on this topic, as it is truly one of my favorite foods. Everyone teases me about this pizza for the bubbles (I LOVE the bubbles), it's one of my thick crust "normal" pizzas:

Good luck! There's nothing that beats the satisfaction of making a pizza that's better than a chains for 3$ when they're shooting out subpar quality pies for 10-15$ or, one place in denver, a large (albiet darned good) cheese wheel for 20$!

[WHT]

I have been able to successfully make pizza dough for a good, authentic Napoli crust - crispy and charred on the bottom and fairly crunchy throughout. I haven't been able to duplicate a Northeast (Philly/NYC) style pizzeria crust, however. I usually use 2 1/2 cups of bread flour with 1/2 to 1 cup of all-purpose nonbleached flour, 1 cup water with salt, 2-3 tablespoons olive oil, and proofed yeast.

Does anyone know the solution to getting that chewier crust?

-Mark

High gluten flour is the key. Also make sure the mineral content of the water is low. At least a 24 hour cold rest of the dough and work the dough at room temp to make the pie.

[Shalmanese]

I made pizzas last night and, while they were good, I had a lot of problems making them big and thin enough. The problem was that I could stretch the dough out, but once I put it down, it would start contracting.

Now, alton brown says that I should knead dough to the windowpane stage, ie: the gluten fully develops. Yet I've read varying kneading times from 5 minutes to 15 minutes. Would less kneading yield a thinner, less chewy crust?

What about the choice of flours? Again, Alton reccomends bread flour for presumably extra gluten. How does the choice of flour change the texture?

edit: I also gather that how you form your dough ball might also have an effect. If you don't have a tight seal on the bottom, then it will tend to form layers rather than one, single flat layer. Would this have an effect as well?

Edited October 17, 2005 by Shalmanese (log)

[srhcb]

I almost hate to admit it, but 45-60 seconds in the food processor does a great job of kneading.

Also, a ten minute rest period after rising makes the dough a lot easier to stretch.

I don't think the choice of flour makes as much difference as the mixing, kneading, stretching procedures.

SB (keep your dough slack)(that sounds almost naughty?)

[JasonTrue]

I remember suffering with a pizza dough that I was making at a friend's home in Japan... I had asked for flour for a pizza dough, and was handed a nice bucket of it, and then I struggled to get the dough to show some signs of gluten development, and to stop wanting more flour. No matter what I did, it seemed not to take.

Finally I asked if there was something different about this flour, and they said "oh, did you want the regular flour? This is for cakes..."

Sometimes the flour type does matter, but I agree, perhaps not as much as people emphasize. The character of a low-gluten flour will be more like Italian pizzas, the high-protein ones will be more like the New York/Philadelphia types.

I usually add extra gluten to my pizza doughs because I undermine the glutens with potatoes.

[ghost]

If the dough contracts when you try and stretch it out... let it rest on the counter for 5-10 minutes. That should do the trick. Also, try and use flour with the highest gluten content you can get if you are trying to get a NYC style pizza. I like Sir Lancelot High Gluten. It works great.

[Mooshmouse]

As noted in my photos from this post, I made pizza this evening as part of a "Serious Foodie" cooking class that I'm taking with some fellow eGulleters.

The recipe we used did call for bread flour with the addition of 2 T semolina and 2 T cornmeal for a denser crust. I made the dough by hand. After forming my dough ball, I kneaded for approximately 5 to 7 minutes and put a lot of muscle into it, gradually adding more flour as I went along. My dough progressed from the sticky stage to becoming more firm; however, from our breadmaking efforts in the previous class, I knew to wait until the dough changed from firm to slightly tacky before I stopped kneading. We gave the dough ample time to rest after the rise, and there was no contracting once we punched it out and shaped it.

End result? Absolutely perfect pizza crust.

[CharityCase]

Great tips mooshmouse.

Must've been a full moon but I made pizza recently too. I've relied on a recipe from an italian cookbook that specifies 3.5C flour, 1.25C water, packet of yeast and 1/2 tsp of sugar.

I found by letting the first rise go for two hours, and letting the dough spend several hours more in the fridge, the bread took on a better complexity and shape even with the usual kneading of 5 minutes or so.

My challenge though has always been getting that same soft yet chewy texture of a takeout pizza...and giving the dough a good flavour too.

Here's a question about flavour: So salt kills yeast, but my recipe says that once the yeast has foamed you can add 1/2tsp of salt. Does that seem ok? Would adding more salt later in the process give more flavour to the dough?

Edited October 18, 2005 by CharityCase (log)

[srhcb]

Here's a question about flavour: So salt kills yeast, but my recipe says that once the yeast has foamed you can add 1/2tsp of salt. Does that seem ok? Would adding more salt later in the process give more flavour to the dough?

←

Don't think of it as "salt kills yeast", but as salt limiting the yeast's rate of multiplication to suit the recipe.

Left unfettered, yeast breed like mice, and your bread will end up with a "yeasty" instead of sharp taste.

SB

[moosnsqrl]

I have, for years, used a recipe I found in Saveur for basic Neopolitan-style pizza crust. It calls for half cake flour, half all purpose, 1 yeast packet (or equiv), 1tsp salt. In addition to the water required to prepare the yeast, I just add it a bit at a time until if forms a good ball (this really varies depending on weather and the flour. If I knead by hand, I do a full 10 minutes; if by dough hook, closer to 5. Three hours rising, punch down, let rest 5 mins and it's generally quite workable.

[lostmyshape]

i also use a mixture of AP and cake flours (about 3:1) to keep the gluten down (trying to mimick italian 00 flour i've heard about, but can't find in Pittsburgh). it makes a great almost NY-style, bubbly crust.

i try to knead as little as possible to keep it from getting too chewy. and as stated, resting is essential to stretching. don't get impatient. if it starts contracting, put a dishtowel over it and come back in 5-10 min.

[consacrer]

Paging Brian Spangler, Brian Spangler to the white courtesy phone, please.

I relocated to Seattle from Portland almost two years ago and I am missing Scholls Public House/Apizza Scholls. I am a novice, but I'd like to develop a tasty pizza that I can make at home. Realizing that my home oven will never really be able to bake up a crust close to what I can order from Apizza Scholls, I would still love to create something less bread-like and more flavorful than what I am turning out now.

Right now I am experimenting in the kitchen, but help from a more experienced e-gulleter is much appreciated. Anybody in the biz willing to contribute some suggestions? I want to know what kind of flour and other ingredients I should be using (and where I can get them as a person off the street), how to assemble the ingredients properly, and how I can maximize the abilities of my home oven for pizza making.

I made two different doughs tonight. Both consist of flour, water, salt, yeast, and a wee bit of honey. The first was made from a Pillsbury bread flour (I have minimal kitchen experience, so my first inclination was to use a flour with slightly higher protein content), the second dough was made from a combination of 80% Bob's Red Mill white, unbromated flour and 20% Softasilk cake flour (because when I tried the pizza made from dough #1, I was highly dissatisfied with the result). Because I started both of these this evening and have not been impressed, I am parking them in the chill chest overnight and then I'll try them out again tomorrow. After comparing the results, I'll move forward to the next round of tests.

[piazzola]

There is a pizza website that some of us go to eventhe masters do dare from time to time post a comment http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/

[prasantrin]

I think it's important to mention what kind of pizza you're looking for--what's the crust like? Is it thick? Thin? Thin and crispy? Thin and chewy? Does the pizza end up with big air pockets near the crust, or not? Without knowing details, it may be difficult to give you helpful hints.

[mikey_a]

The "breadiness" of my dough seems to depend on how much kneading I impose on it and how thick its rolled.

The method is:

combine

320ml tepid Water

2 tsp dried yeast

1 tsp honey

and wait 'till it froths up

add it to a well in the middle of:

1lb bread flour (ours is 16% protein - a bit harder than US)

1 tsp salt

add about 20ml of flavourfull olive oil

mix with a dough-hook equipped device (mine's a kenwood but any'll do)

until it sticks together and becomes uniform in colour/texture (~5mins). cover the bowl with cling-wrap.

at this point I begin pre-heating the oven. I have 3 pizza stones, top, middle and bottom. pre-heat (non fan-forced) on my sloooow blanco takes more than 1.5 hrs so be patient.

after a couple of hours your dough will be puffy and damp.

divide into 3 or 4 (depending on thickness), roll out (tapered rolling pin is easiest for circles) and bung onto 3 (or 4) semolina dusted pizza trays. allow to rest/rise while you prepare the toppings.

with my oven flat-out at 250C I leave the pizzas for about 5mins on their trays and then shuffle them off (with pizza peel) straight onto the pizza stone to crisp their little bottoms. 6-8 mins later they're nice and brown and ready to shovel professionally out onto a cooling rack.

my favourite topping is fine-sliced potato with anchovies (torn-up) and garlic

my 6yo daughter favours broccoli!!! (+cheese tomato and garlic)

and mrs mikey's preference is for ham and pineapple

(we're australian after all....)

sideline - my friend's mother-in-law is an old italian nonna who was in the resistance during the war. she is a black-dressing, sombre person who weeps often in the course of a day. when told that australians often put pineapple on pizza she at first smiled and then broke into hitherto unseen laughter. welcome to the new-er world.