January 1, 2010 - 4:09pm
Pizzas at Pelican Point
In addition to the Greek bread, about which I wrote yesterday, I made a couple of pizzas while visiting with family this week. I used the pizza dough formula in Hamelman's bread, but used Pivetti typo 00 flour from nybakers.com, made the dough with sourdough rather than commercial yeast, and did all the mixing by hand.
Ham & Pineapple Pizza
Chanterelle, Crimini, Leek, Olive, Mozzarella and Parmesan Pizza
Slice
Jonathan & Glenn watching Pizza TV
The chopped veggies were for the fab barbecued turkey gumbo brother Glenn made for dinner. The pizzas were just an appetizer.
David
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Comments
Looks great. I haven't tried Hamelman's piza dough. But after seeing this we may have to try it for pizza this Fri.
lol "pizza TV" - we need a subscription to that channel!
Pizza TV! I love it...What great combinations on the pies! I know you all had a total ball...it just doesn't get any bettter!
Happy New Year!
Sylvia
And Happy New Year to you!
David
Hi David,
Happy New Year!
So often my husband would sneak behind me while I stared at the oven and said, "it must be a great TV show!" I would normally fix my eyes at the oven door at the first few minutes of a dough being loaded onto the baking stone. Then if he happened to spot me doing that again at the last few minutes of the bake, as I often do, he would say, "Changed the channel?"
Pizza oven TV would have to be one of the best TV shows in town!
Shiao-Ping
Words and pictures cannot describe how amazing those pizzas tasted. Thanks for leaving some of the wonderful pizza dough, David. Tonight Cat and I made a ham, pineapple and goat cheese pie, and a red onion, mushroom, cherry tomato, mozzarella and parmagiano pie, both with the simple tomato sauce you recommended. The first one was with a very thin crust and came out best. The other was thicker and too chewy. Maybe cuz it was handled too much or just not stretched enough. Or maybe it needed to be baked a bit longer. I should have been watching more carefully when you formed the crusts the other night.
Please do email me the dough recipe. I'll use the sourdough starter you "hid" in our fridge.
Happy New Year!
Glenn
Now you're hooked! You are going to activate the starter? Woo hoo!
Your incubation period was way shorter than Stephanie's. It must be your advanced age.
To give credit where credit's due, the sauce is from Peter Reinhart's "American Pie" via FloydM's "Pizza Primer" on TFL. (I sent you a link to it in an e-mail.)
I'll type up the dough recipe I used and e-mail it to you.
David
Welcome Glenn, glad your brother lured you into the fold..OK..I quit the puns..they were pretty good though : )
Betty
Pizza puns?
David
Hi, Glenn.
This was my adaptation of the recipe for Pizza Dough published in Jeffrey Hamelman's “Bread.” BTW, if you do get into bread baking, Hamelman's book is a “must buy.” His formula calls for a “biga” which is the common Italian “pre-ferment” - A portion of the water, flour and salt in the recipe is mixed and allowed to ferment for several hours before the rest of the ingredients are mixed in. Pre-fermenting part of the dough this way enhances the flavor of the final product.
A recipe calling for a pre-ferment can be converted to sourdough by noting the final weight and the proportion of flour to water in the pre-ferment and building a sourdough starter of about the same weight and hydration. That's what I did.
The second issue is that you don't have a kitchen scale, as far as I know. (I strongly advise you to purchase one ASAP, if you think you will be continuing to bake. It permits more accurate measurement of ingredients and, therefore, more reproducible results.) I will give you both weights and volume measurements.
The third issue is that you don't have a stand mixer. Therefore I will give you instructions for hand mixing the dough.
Sourdough Pizza Dough
Sourdough Starter
Ingredients
Volume
Weight
Sourdough starter (firm)
2 T
1 oz
Flour
7/8 Cup
3.6 oz
W
ater
½ Cup
4.4 oz
Final dough
Ingredients
Volume
Weight
Flour
3 3/8 Cup
14.6 oz
Water
1 ¼ Cup
10.2 oz
Salt
½ T
0.3 oz
Olive oil
2 T
0.9 oz
Sourdough starter
All of above
9 oz
Total
2 lb, 1 oz
Procedures
Activate the starter the night before mixing the final dough. In a medium mixing bowl, disperse the firm starter in the water by breaking it into small pieces and smearing them against the side of the bowl and stirring into the water.
Add the flour and mix until it is all moistened well. I find a rubber spatula works well for this.
Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and leave it to ferment on the counter for 12 hours or so. It should be very bubbly and expanded by 100%.
To make the final dough, transfer the starter to a large bowl. Add the water and oil and mix thoroughly.
In another bowl, mix the flour and salt together, then add this mixture to the large bowl and mix to a shaggy mass.
Cover the bowl and let it rest for 20-60 minutes. This allows the flour to absorb the water and the gluten to start forming.
“Knead” the dough using the “Stretch and Fold in the Bowl” technique:
You insert your scraper between the dough and the bowl at 12 o'clock (assuming you are at 6 o'clock) and stretch the dough your scraper contacts up and over the ball of dough and press it into the dough. If you do this fast, the dough will release the scraper. Maybe some will stick to it.
Turn the bowl 1/5 turn. (I am right-handed and rotate the bowl clockwise.) Insert your scraper between the new portion of dough now at 12 o'clock and do as described above again. Repeat this turn, insert, stretch, press, release maneuver 20 times.
Cover the bowl and set a timer for 20 minutes.
Repeat this procedure 3 times.
Set your timer for 45 minutes.
When the timer goes off, scrape the dough onto a floured board and stretch it into a large rectangle. Fold it like an envelope (tri-fold), smooth side up, and return the dough to the bowl. Cover. Set your timer for 45 minutes, and, when it goes off, repeat this stretching and folding.
Return the dough to the bowl and cover tightly. Place the bowl in a warm place and allow it to double in volume. This may take 2-6 hours, depending on room temperature.
Divide the dough in two portions. Gently form each piece into a ball. Place each in a 1 qt Ziploc bag into which you have placed a tablespoon of olive oil and smeared it around. (Note: Each piece will make a 10" pizza. If you want to make smaller pizzas, divide the dough into a larger number of smaller pieces. The ham and pineapple pizza above was made with 8 oz of dough. The larger mushroom pizza was made with 16 oz of dough.)
Refrigerate for 2 hours or up to 3 days before using.
Enjoy!
David