Pizza Bases

[Psi]

If making pizza at home, my best advice for excellent professional results at home are
- Get proper 00 grade flour (My ratio is: 425g OO flour, 234g water, 8g sugar, 8g salt, 13g olive oil, 3/4tsp yeast)
- Mix it by weight and use the right hydration level for 00 flour.  55% works well for me  (this is what I used above, but test 60% and 65% as different flour behaves differently)
- Use semolina flour when shaping the pizza to stop it sticking to your hands/rolling pin etc.. (a coating of semolina on the outside will make the crust really nice)
- Use a pizza stone or steel for cooking
- Put the stone/steel in the oven and set the temp as high as it will go for 1 hour before inserting the pizza (to get the stone really hot for crispy bottom of pizza).
- When ready, put the pizza in and immediately turn the temp down to 260C (500F)
- Cook for 11-14min

Some other pro tips:
Commercial kitchen food supply stores often sell nice ready-to-use pizza sauce, but it will be in a commercial size package (pretty large).
They will also have 20kg bags of 00 flour which will be much cheaper than supermarket 00 flour
My time/temps are for a generic home oven, if you have a more professional oven you will get better results at a higher temp for less time.

[Halcyon]

I would love to build my own outdoor wood fired oven. I find the temperature on most home ovens don't go hot enough. I think mine maxes out at 260 degrees.

[janoc]

You may want this project instead, keeping with the theme of the forum:







 

[mon2]

Looks delicious!! Yum!! 

[T3sl4co1l]

FYI: I find using a cup of *packed* bread flour, to a cup of water, is about the right ratio.  Fast, and doesn't need a scale.  Note: I keep my flour in the freezer to reduce rancidity; whatever effect this has on humidity (low, presumably?), take that into effect.  YMMV, adjust hydration as needed (add water and knead it in, eh, good luck; easier to go too much and knead in flour until it's right).

Hmm, I should get some pizza toppings...

Tim

[janoc]

FYI: I find using a cup of *packed* bread flour, to a cup of water, is about the right ratio. 

Sadly, an advice like that really does not translate internationally. Not because we don't measure in cups but because the flour is different everywhere!

I have found this out the hard way when I have moved to France. So what you may have as "bread flour" could be very different from mine - how coarsely (or not) it has been ground, how much humidity is in it, what is the starch content ... Heck, even yeast is not the same.

Baking is not science or engineering, unfortunately - so you will need to try and adapt based on how your own dough comes out.

[janoc]

Looks delicious!! Yum!! 

It is - but it took him several months to get there, including a master class in Italy

Alex's channel is worth watching - not so much for recipes these days but for the engineering approach to cooking. He is an EE, finally.

(and sometimes the insane hacks - pasta machine driven by a cordless drill anyone?)

[drussell]

(and sometimes the insane hacks - pasta machine driven by a cordless drill anyone?)

I used a cordless drill to run my pasta squeezer a couple years ago when I was at the lake and I somehow forgot to bring the crank handle for it.  I just used a masonry bit that happened to be the right size to engage where the little tabs should be.  My mom laughed, but certainly loved the pasta it made.

Worked great.   

[Yellofriend]

Old topic, so not sure if people still eat pizza ;-)

I do the dough according to this calculator:

https://scale-pizza.netlify.app/pizza/

Takes 20 hours, but it's worth it. You will have a very formable dough and is very easy to shape by hand.

For the flour, bread flour (aka T55/550/405) works if you can't get 00 type. If I can't get 00 I mix 50% each bread and noodle flour. I don't add sugar or oil. Salt I set higher, about 2.3%

However, the normal home ovens usually do not get hot enough. Mine does 400°C (similar to 3GFerarri), if you like pizza I can highly recommend that type oven (mine wasn't designed for pizza and made it only to 250°C, but after some fiddling with the thermostat.... )

[Psi]

Couple of extra thing ive discovered since making the first post

1) If you want cheese stuffed crust pizza
- Place two sheets of baking paper on the bench, add some flour to the top to prevent sticking
- Roll/stretch out the pizza a little bigger than you need.
- cut the cheese into slices about 7x7mm and 40mm long or so.
- Place the cheese pieces right on the edge around the pizza
- roll the dough over the cheeze and keep rolling a bit more. You need to roll it more than 360deg. you want maybe 440 deg rotation so the cheese is fully trapped.
- pinch the joins shut.
- Now flip the pizza upside down by pulling out the bottom baking paper and putting it on the top, then you can flip it upside down.
- Now that you have it upside down you can add your sauce and toppings.  Having the join trapped underneath stops it from unrolling when it cooks.
- When the pizza comes out of the oven leave it for 5-10min so the cheese turns solid before cutting

That technique should work to make any pizza dough into cheese stuffed crust without cheese leaking out and messing up the oven.
Some dough hydrations just stick back together really well while others do not. But the above technique is pretty foolproof


2) I'm currently testing adding potato flakes to the dough, apparently it helps make it softer. Will post tomorrow after I test it, currently the dough is resting.

3) Look for semi-dried herbs.  Fresh is better but semi-dried is WAY better than fully dried and much easier to store for months.

[Marco]

Curious no one has cobbled together an electrically heated steel/stone, a convection oven can probably match the top heat input of a stone oven at significantly lower temperatures, just need to match the bottom then.

That said, I prefer Detroit pizza which needs nothing much special base or oven wise ... shame about the calories.

[Yellofriend]

Curious no one has cobbled together an electrically heated steel/stone, a convection oven can probably match the top heat input of a stone oven at significantly lower temperatures, just need to match the bottom then.

If you look at the G3 Ferrari type oven there isn't very much to it.

A heating element (maybe 1200W) at the bottom, under the pizza stone, and same heating element on top. Heat control is optional, mine is sort of stopping at 400°C - that is good enough for a ~3 Minute pizza. I don't have that brand but I am telling you this type oven makes REALLY good pizza.

[Psi]

Update:

The  1/4 cup potato flakes + 4x their weight in water added to dough made the dough a bit too wet and harder to roll.

It also expanded lots more than usual making a thicker base.  Some of that is just due to being a wet dough.
But i think next time i will cut the added water for potato flakes down to 2x weight.
Might also make a smaller amount of dough and roll it a bit thinner.

But i do think it made the base softer. which is what it's supposed to do.

[T3sl4co1l]

Would that work, make balls instead and now you've got potato rolls?

Tim

[Psi]

Would that work, make balls instead and now you've got potato rolls?

Tim

It's more bready than potatoy at the quantity i used.
The potato flakes just gives it a bit more softness. They're also often used in bread loafs to make them softer.

[amwales]

I'll have to dig up the recipe but 00 flour is the way to go.
We bought a pizza oven over a year, maybe longer and its from a company called ooni it gets VERY hot, pizza cooks so fast you have to watch it.
Pic attached, hopefully...

[Halcyon]

I'll have to dig up the recipe but 00 flour is the way to go.
We bought a pizza oven over a year, maybe longer and its from a company called ooni it gets VERY hot, pizza cooks so fast you have to watch it.
Pic attached, hopefully...

Amazing results. That burnish around the edges is something you really can't get in a normal oven. The heat is too evenly distributed and all the toppings end up looking the same.

[Psi]

There's a difference between getting the leopard skin effect on pizza vs just burnt areas. Mostly related to the size of the area you can get the effect on.  You can get small areas in a normal oven at max temp, but you need a higher temp to get it all over the pizza. There needs to be a larger vertical temp gradient than a normal oven can do (without hacks)

TIP: If you want to make yourself feel sad, google image search "Burnt Pizza"

[Refrigerator]

Oh cool a pizza thread, time for me to chip in.
Out of boredom in the uni dorm i've spent a bunch of time experimenting with pizzamaking in the oven. It is just a regular electric oven.
My main goal was to get the underside of the pad to cook properly like on a pizza stone.
I don't go by measurements but rather by feel, which is highly subjective but i try to take the subjectiveness out of it.
How i make a pizza:
1) Get the kind of flour that runs like sand in an hourglass.
2) Put about a cup of flour in a bowl
3) Pour some water in a cup. It should be slightly too much for your dough.
4) Add some sugar and yeast to the water. Not sure if the sugar does anything tbh.
5) Add some salt and a little bit of cooking oil to the flour.
6) Add the yeast water to the flour and start mixing.
7) Your dough should now be too wet, so you keep kneading and adding flour a little bit at a time.
At first your dough will stick to your hands but there will come a point when the dough will pick itself off your hands. It will still be tacky but not sticky.
8 ) Cover up the dough and leave it be for 2 hours. 1 hour is too little and 1,5 feels marginal.
9) Before you start working the dough into shape turn on the bottom heater on your oven and set on max heat.
10) Throw some of the same flour on a clean table and start working your dough into shape.
Streching by hand is fine but i couldn't get consistent thickness so i roll it out with a glass wine bottle.
11) Put the pad on a tray and put your toppings on the pad.
12) Load it into the oven on the bottom level (i don't know what it's called), close to the bottom heater.
13) Keep checking the bottom of the pad occasionally and just before it's done pull the tray out and place it higher up in the oven, one step below the top heater.
14) Turn on the top grill and keep your eyes on the pizza because the moment you look away it will catch fire.

Step 12 gets the bottom browned, step 14 gets the top roasted. What you get is a sort of emulation of a pizza oven.
When it looks good you pull it out and that's it. I've never had problems with my pizzas sticking to the tray, most of the time they just slide right off.
My friends have said that my pizzas are better than what you can get here in pizza places but i disagree.
Every time i make a pizza i notice little imperfections and things to improve in the next iretarion.

Ps: In a uni dorm this certainly beats instant noodles. It's quite funny sometimes when you rock up to the kitchen with a bigass pizza while other pople are making instant noodles or whatever equivalent they come up with.
PPs: but nothing beats that time i walked into the kitchen to find two guys from the robotics course making cotton candy on a homemade cotton candy machine.

[beanflying]

BURP 

Doing some work on my Car at a mates place for tool reasons and took along some Pizza dough ingredients to point at his Pizza Oven he made a while ago. The Heathen with his fancy oven has been using commercial Pizza bases in it 

Quick how to make dough lesson got his hands in the bowl before getting in the grease and oil from my car and prepped for post mechanical work.

Raided his garden for some Capsicum, Onions and Tomatoes added a little Bacon and Pepporoni and of my home made Tomato base. Not bad for a first go with real dough.

Ulterior motive if I am going to get an invite again NFW in Hell do I want plastic bases on my wood fired Pizza Left him a spare mixing bowl, yeast and a recipe.

** Quantity of dough below is for two good sized bases.

[tszaboo]

Curious no one has cobbled together an electrically heated steel/stone, a convection oven can probably match the top heat input of a stone oven at significantly lower temperatures, just need to match the bottom then.

That said, I prefer Detroit pizza which needs nothing much special base or oven wise ... shame about the calories.

You mean something like this?

It's like 100 EUR, heats up in 8 minutes, makes a pizza every 10-15 minutes.
The one on the picture is slightly large, mine works great at 30-32cm ones.

[Refrigerator]

BURP 

Doing some work on my Car at a mates place for tool reasons and took along some Pizza dough ingredients to point at his Pizza Oven he made a while ago. The Heathen with his fancy oven has been using commercial Pizza bases in it 

Quick how to make dough lesson got his hands in the bowl before getting in the grease and oil from my car and prepped for post mechanical work.

Raided his garden for some Capsicum, Onions and Tomatoes added a little Bacon and Pepporoni and of my home made Tomato base. Not bad for a first go with real dough.

Ulterior motive if I am going to get an invite again NFW in Hell do I want plastic bases on my wood fired Pizza Left him a spare mixing bowl, yeast and a recipe.

** Quantity of dough below is for two good sized bases.

Aw man i should build a pizza oven for myself too.
Here's some pics of what i make in the public kitchen in my uni dorm.

[Caitlin555]

I love pizza, trying this tonight!!

[BrokenYugo]

For thin crust I have a thickish (4-5mm) cast iron flat griddle that I put on top rack, crank the oven to max to preheat, then flip to broil (top broil oven) and put the pizza in. Works best if your oven isn't a POS like mine that shuts down if you fire the broiler with the door shut for very long, and a steel plate more like 1/4" or 6mm would probably help too.

 If you're running a gas oven this hard open a window or have an exhaust fan going, or you may end up with a CO problem.

[Psi]

I've been using a pizza steel instead of a stone.  the main thing it seems to do is make the bottom of the pizza crisper faster.