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[giotto]

Widespreadpizza:

It's interesting when I look at these two pictures to observe the differences a flour can make.  Both pizzas involved a 2 day delayed fermentation at cooler temps, and included no sugars with 750F to 800F oven temps.  But that's where their similarites pretty much ended. 

- The Caputo flour produced its pizza in a wood oven, and it produced plenty of black spots offset by a paler pita look. Whereas the All-Purpose flour involved a woodstone gas oven, and produced char that came off on my fingers with an overall darker color. 
- The Caputo used 57% hydration, 2.4% salt and included a very small amount of fat (1.8% olive oil) to act as a softening agent, while curbing its temperamental nature with time spans in the oven.  The All-Purpose involved 65% hydration, 1.25% salt and no oils.  Both have nominal amounts of yeast.
- The Caputo was made into a 9.5 oz dough ball for an 11" pizza, which produces a thin layer of dough with skins that easily separate. The All-Purpose was made into a 13" medium pizza from a 13.5 oz dough ball, resulting in a denser layer of dough.  Both were hand tossed with no tears in sight.
- The Caputo produced a soft and airy pizza and was eaten by rolling it up.  The all-purpose produced a light but denser pizza and had a strong pull/tug/chew to it while folded in the center. 

The Caputo-based pizza was taken over a year ago from A16; the All-Purpose based pizza was about the same time frame from Amicis in Mtn View, CA. You can find more details regarding A16 that I placed under the A16 link some time ago.

Regarding your question on the amount of fermentation time to reduce sugars, that is somewhat dependent on the falling rate specs of the flour (that determine amylase activity). Other factors may include the amount of yeast, whether its wild or a more aggressive commercial form, and amounts of salt, which can deter yeast activity.  You'll note that Amicis uses very little salt.  They use only 2 oz of fresh yeast per 30 lbs of flour.  I've found that with nominal amounts of active yeast (about 1/16 tsp per 10 oz of flour), and 1.8% salt, I start to deplete the amount of sugar produced in typical American flours after 3 or 4 days.  After that, I start getting a lighter pizza crust and my spring starts to get impacted as well.

[giotto]

When I look at Pete-zza's rock formation shown earlier, I can't help but suddenly wonder what the effect would be of adding charcoals from a charcoal starter into a thin enclosure like I use in my BBQ now and place it into the oven at the same level or close level to the pizza.  You can set the relative space between your pizza and the coals and determine their temp by placing your hand over it... If you can leave your hand there for 3 seconds, you're at about 500F, 4 seconds is about 425F, etc.  When the coals are white, you are at 1 second or less and you are up there in heat.  Instead of placing the pizza on top of the coals (similar to the way Good Eats did with a steak, or what Pete-zza did on top of the rocks), you can rotate the pizza around every minute, while keeping the coals at the side, for an inside high temp pizza. This limits space when you place it on the same level.  But what the hey. Hmmm.  Just don't drop those charcoals on the kitchen floor.  

[Pete-zza]

giotto,

Always good to have you back and to read your posts.

I was wondering whether the ingredients and quantities you mentioned in respect of the Amici's dough are those actually used at Amici's or are the ones you have been using to emulate the Amici's dough. What you posted bears an eerie resemblance to what the old NYC masters used to make their NY style pizzas. They used all-purpose flour, high hydration (Evelyne Slomon said 65%), salt, a small amount of yeast, and a room temperature fermentation (it took until the 1930s for refrigeration to make a dent). No oil and no sugar were used. But they had high temperature ovens, usually coal ovens.

What Willard has offered with his 2stone unit is an opportunity for people to add high temperature to the equation. Using the dough formulation you mentioned, one might be able to use the 2stone unit to come fairly close to the classic NY style pizzas of the old masters.

I read somewhere that Amici's uses a "high-protein" all-purpose flour. Do you know what that means?

Peter

[giotto]

Hi Pete-zza:

Thanks for the welcome back.  Always good to see you here. 

These are the exact details related to Amicis.  Some of their locations use wood; but my fav is in Mtn View, CA, which employs a Woodstone gas oven that breathes fire on the side.  Some people complain about the "burnt spots" and char on their hands. That really hurts...  It's like BBQ, I see these bad reviews because people don't like crispy goodness.

They do cool down their dough temp initially by employing 20% ice water as part of their hydration.  The name of their flour escapes me at the moment.  By higher protein, it's sort of like KA suggests their 11.7% all purpose is higher protein than others.  I've used Mondako Pendelton, which is 12% protein all-purpose, and this stuff can stretch into a big ol' web without a tear and minimal knead time.

I am a big fan of what Willard and others have done with his invention, and thank his tremendous efforts to bring such a device into being and at a price that makes it feasible for us poor folk.  We all know about experimenting into the wee bee hours of the nights.  I'm wondering if his outside oven version via a Home Depot heating source can be set at different temps.

[widespreadpizza]

Giotto,  when you say the spring gets impacted,  do you mean in a good way?  -marc

[giotto]

Widespread:

Since you're not feeding it on an ongoing basis, the lack of sugar or food can start to have an adverse impact on the yeast. Over extended times, it becomes useful as a bacterial acedic feed or scrap dough preferment for other doughs, similar to ACME's use of scrap dough in their San Francisco baguettes.  It can start to get pretty watery as well after a week or so.

[mmarston]

Widespread and Giotto,

Thank you for kicking this thread up a notch or three!

Willard's inventions have kicked my pizza up a number of notches. Finally I'm very close to the pizza I've been dreaming of ever since I left Brooklyn.
 

Michael

[2stone]

Thanks for all the kind words
and all the encouragement,

Giotto,

I like the examples you posted, It is interesting how longer
fermentation times depletes the sugars and changes the appearance
of the finished pie. I wonder if it also effects the texture and
induces more surface blistering.

regards,
willard


here are some "leopard skins"
done in the 2stone Oven at 1000+

 

[mmarston]

Willard,

That is a lovely photo of your flat breads.

I'd like to take this opportunity to bring up the topic of white balance in photography.
Many photos on the forum exhibit incorrect white balance and thus give the picture an unnatural color. Different light sources that can look the same to the eye have different spectrums and thus can render color in very different ways. Daylight/flash, fluorescent (warm/cool/natural) and household tungsten light are all very different. Automatic white balance does not always determine the correct setting. 
Giottos pictures at reply 440 are a good example of this problem. The New York (AP) picture is much too yellow/red compared to the Caputo picture.
This is a forum about pizza so I will not go into a long explanation of this topic unless someone requests it.

Read the manual.

Michael

[canadianbacon]

Hi Michael,

Please do. I'm sure not only I, but others would love to learn a trick or two, if you care to share what you
know with us.

Much appreciated if you can post a little bit on this topic.  I'm alway willing to learn.

Thanks from me and others I'm sure.

Mark

This is a forum about pizza so I will not go into a long explanation of this topic unless someone requests it.
Michael

[mmarston]

Mark,

I'm getting ready for bed but I will do my best to provide a short lesson regarding color temperature (degrees Kelvin) soon.

Michael

[2stone]

Hey Michael,

I took  photography in collage and made some extra money
doing portraits. Unfortunately now I just grab the camera and
set it on auto and shoot. My son scolded me and told me it was very
unprofessional to use the flash like I do. when I have a chance I throw
them outside so the flash doesn't go off. It would be real nice to set up an
area with good lighting etc.
What bothers me more than anything is what the compression does to a nice picture.

willard
 

[canadianbacon]

Hi Michael,

It's about that time for me also Michael.  anyway, thanks in advance, whenever you have time to
do a little tutorial, that would be nice.

thanks and good evening.

Mark

Mark,

I'm getting ready for bed but I will do my best to provide a short lesson regarding color temperature (degrees Kelvin) soon.

Michael

[Pete-zza]

Michael,

Because of the general nature of the topic, you might want to start a new thread, maybe under Chitchat.
Thanks.

Peter

[mmarston]

Rather than reinvent the wheel I'll provide links to two good tutorials on white balance.
I'll start another thread if people have questions.

http://www.cambridgeincolour.com/tutorials/white-balance.htm

http://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/whitebalance.htm

Michael

[giotto]

Unfortunately, the cheap old cell phone available for the NY pic had a tough time in any lighting condition.

So I'm curious... Are you getting Char dust from the 2 stone, the kind that comes off on your fingers, or are you getting mostly burn marks that you get in many Pita breads that cave in when you touch them, especially just after baking?  That's extremely important to me.  Things like indirect vs. direct fire contact, distance to heat source, and composition of walls to radiate heat are just a few areas sited by manufacturers to contribute differences.  If I take a tortilla, for example, and put it over a fire, I increase the rustic look of the tortilla; but they're burn marks. I've done the same with pizza dough on a grill. It would sure be cool if the 2stone can manage char in addition to the beautiful presentation.  R the side walls all metal?

[2stone]

Giotto,

I applaud anybody who strives to uphold and promote high quality pizza.
When I say high quality, that is of course subjective. Everyone has there
own opinion of what good pizza is.
I have made many wood fired pizzas. Many of them were done at extremely
high temperatures. That is the type of pizza I like. (I don't like burnt pizza)
My main objectives for the 2stone were and still are to:

1. Duplicate many of the inherent qualities of a high heat wood fired oven.
2. Reduce preheat or ramp up times.
3. Provide an alternate method at an affordable price.

I did not set out to preserve time honored methods and procedures, but rather
to make the pizzas that those methods produce available to a wider audience.
I applaud people like PFTaylor for taking a stab at a wood fired oven, by following his
own instincts. After all that is how all the other great time honored ovens were designed.
The 2stone is not for every one, but it serves a purpose. (and meets certain objectives)
I have and continue to enjoy participating in the process. I've had fun improving on my own
pizza making, and have as much or more fun watching others do the same.
You enlightened me on some of the nuances of fermentation, which further adds to my
understanding of how important dough formulation is to the whole process.
I guess I don't have answers to all the questions.

regards,
willard
     

[cd1168]

well, i just got an email from UPS saying i have a 15 1/4" on the way

i have the cultures, i have the dlx mixer, i follow recipes on here.  and finally this time next week i will have the high HEAT.. thanks Willard..

i will call you about instructions. somewhere i remember someone posting on here about some sort of break in period at lower heat or something..
'
-chris

[giotto]

Willard (and others):

Nuances are like fine details, which as you suggest, are in many ways in the eyes of the beholder.  They are the very thing that can cause an Artisan to be satisfied or dissastisfied with his own craft.  And when it comes to the particulars of food, they are the very thing that can cause the author of his own creations to reach different conclusions from those that he serves, and even at times in contrast to rave reviews.  I have had my share of occassions when those that I serve tell me that my latest creation is no different than an earlier serving; but I know when it's right and when it's not.  As you so truly point out, it is a matter of taste.  And quite fortunately for me, your goals are right on in my book.

Hence when I ask questions in this thread, they are by no means meant to suggest that there is a universal truth; but instead, they are to suggest that I know exactly what I am still striving for.  All too often, this involves particulars.  So when I make a concerted effort to delineate the differences in the form of a question, my objective is to pry open the doors and avoid a mistake in acquisition due to preference.  And answers that avoid misinterpretation on my part are deeply appreciated. 

You mention that as an Artisan with high temp pizzas, your goal is to avoid burnt pizza.  I assume by mapping this to my question that your blackened spots on your flatbread and pizzas therefore do indeed produce char with the Bayou.  Like I said, it's a preference, and despite this preference, I have enjoyed the other side with peppers and tortillas merely blackened over fire.  So now onto my final exploration. 

When it comes to composition of dough, I know what ingredients, flour implications and pre-cooking handling techniques can impact a tender exterior along with a moist and even open interior.  But the additional impact of high heat can escape me in some cases.  But as a natural result of this thread, I am determined to get to the bottom of it.  So any discourse that will shed an explanation to the following factor would be much appreciated.  I have noticed with Neapolitan style pizzas that the crust can be easily rolled up, as if there was no impact from the high temperatures (shown below).  Yet the blackened spots all over the pizza will quickly attest to the fact that this pizza was indeed cooked at high temps.  Now of course, as Bill mentioned earlier, it doesn't take long with a flour like Caputo to quickly take a turn for the worst.  I've certainly crossed that path with Caputo before.  Hmmm... I suddenly just realized something from that last point that had not dawned on me until now.  Let me continue though... And with Amicis, I have ended up with char on my hands from their high temps, along with an overall deep color.  Yet I could fold the puppy in half, NY style, no different than an undercooked pizza.  Damn, I think I got it.  Originally, it was at this point that I was going to ask the question, which was what gives... Why are these guys able to exude such an exterior at high heat temperatures without screwing up the interior or overall softness, and without additives (e.g., fats) or extraordinarily high hydrations?  Some may mistakenly believe it's the soft wheat employed by Caputo; but that's simply not the case cosidering the All-Purpose employed by others like Amicis, and most people don't realize that the 00 rating of Caputo has nothing to do with its protein level, which is actually comparable to a higher all-purpose protein level... And of course, the higher the protein, the more likely it will harden or stiffen over time.

But my instinct suddenly tells me that high heat does not necessarily adversely impact the interior at the same time frame as the exterior, nor does it necessarily occur at the same rates as lower temps, when designed as such.  Hmmm... And that of course, in so many respects, is what can be so right about it all.  That's my thought anyways.  What say you, Willard?

Amicis, of course, as I mentioned earlier gets a different overall browning effect because they use a malted barley flour, which produces a more natural sugar extraction, and produces an overall color from its carmelization.  Their fermentation process and the falling rates of their flour complement the level of browning that they look for.  But independent of these trivial points, both high heat examples produce a beautiful presentation, without screwing up the inside.  That to me is a huge benefit.  When we cook at temps in the 550F and below, the exterior color can run out of synch with the interior.  By the time that damn thing develops color (and of course you never get char), the timing of the rest of the crust can take a turn for the worst. Although the window of opportunity to screw things up is not a whole lot different.  Now, there are other considerations.  For example, Artisan breads are often baked at temps that run from 375F - 450F.  And with 25+ minutes of cooking, the exteriors of rustic breads are nicely browned with wonderfully open and moist interiors.  But that is because of hydration rates that generally vary between 75% to 85%, with vast amounts of steam protecting the interior.  Steam is also added at the beginning of the baking process to add a sheen to the exterior and to help aid in the production of those big ol' open cuts that enhance the presentation of the rustic bread exterior.  In the case of Chicago pizza, which uses elongated times, the crust is enclosed inside a deep dish pan, and both sides of the crust are enclosed by steaming elements.  And finally other factors can play a role in the overall balance of the exterior, which can be influenced by sugars. Tonight, for example, I royally screwed up a pizza because I was working with a flour that I was unfamiliar with, and I was using its color to establish its completion time; but with 3 days of cool fermentation, its amylase process just wasn't able to handle this long of a time frame, and I ended up with an overly hard pizza by the time I got color, which had occurred more prominently from a portion of the same dough with only 12 hours of fermentation.  I got the usual kudos from others.  But that was BS.  A younger lad told me it was tough.  I'll have to make sure he is around in the event that I ever have a tailor make me some clothes.

Now, with that in mind:

1) Are you getting crusts that can be folded without cracking in your flatbreads and pizza crusts, while also achieving those great exteriors?  This is not a hit against your Artisan quality.  It's something that I want to validate. 

2) Are you finding any advantage to achieving these results with the 1000F Bayou variation vs. the lower heat attained with the 2 stone via other variations?  This will help me synch up my exploration above, since my interest is in a Bayou variation.

3) Have you found any difference in making a 14 inch vs. a 10 inch pizza on your 15+ inch Bayou variation?

4) Lastly, what are the dimensions and weight of your Bayou variation (which will help me understand portability)?

Much appreciation!

[Pete-zza]

giotto,

I was very intrigued by your description of the Amici’s dough formulation because, as best I can tell, Amici’s is using essentially the same dough formulation and methods as used by the old NYC masters who made the NY style pizzas after the turn of the 20th century. In their case, they used mostly coal-fired ovens rather than the Woodstone ovens used by Amici’s, but the results no doubt were quite similar.

Based on what you said about the Amici’s dough formulation, I used the Lehmann dough calculating tool at http://www.pizzamaking.com/dough_calculator.html to come up with the following for the Amici’s dough formulation:

Flour (100%): Water (65%): CY (0.41666%): Salt (1.25%): Total (166.66666%):

13608 g  |  480 oz | 30 lbs 8845.2 g  |  312 oz | 19.5 lbs 56.7 g | 2 oz | 0.12 lbs | 170.1 g | 6 oz | 0.38 lbs | 10.16 tbsp | 0.63 cups 22680 g | 800 oz | 50 lbs | TF = N/A

(Note: 20% of the formula water is ice water)

Looking at the above dough formulation, the similarities between what Amici’s is doing and what the old masters did are quite striking. For example, in terms of ingredients, the old masters used what was readily available to them, including all-purpose flour (high-gluten flours for pizza dough didn’t emerge until much later) and fresh yeast (ADY wasn’t invented until around World War II, and IDY was invented sometime in the 1970’s, I believe). According to what Evelyne Slomon has said and written, a hydration of around 65% apparently was quite common. (That is also the hydration she now recommends when using all-purpose flour for the NY style.) The doughs were fermented at room temperature because refrigeration hadn’t yet been invented. The skins were quite thin. Whether this was intentional or accidental, I do not know, but I do know that if the skins were too thick and high oven temperatures and short bake times were used, the finished crusts could have pasty or uncooked portions. Based on what Evelyne has said elsewhere on the forum about typical dough weights and pizza sizes of the old masters, I calculated thickness factors that ranged from about 0.07 to 0.09. So, indeed, the skins were quite thin, and the finished crusts were foldable. You didn’t indicate what size pizzas Amici’s makes, and how much dough is used for those sizes, but the 13” 13.5-ounce example you gave translates to a thickness factor of 0.1017085.

I thought it might be useful and instructive for someone to try the above dough formulation with the 2stone setup and to post some photos of the results. Since few of our members use cake yeast, and given the stone size of the basic 2stone setup, I converted the above dough formula to a 12” size and substituted IDY for the cake yeast. Doing this, and assuming I didn’t make any mistakes anywhere, I get the following:

Flour (100%): Water (65.29%): IDY (0.13888%): Salt (1.25%): Total (166.67888%):

198.59 g  |  7 oz | 0.44 lbs 129.66 g  |  4.57 oz | 0.29 lbs 0.28 g | 0.01 oz | 0 lbs | 0.09 tsp | 0.03 tbsp 2.48 g | 0.09 oz | 0.01 lbs | 0.44 tsp | 0.15 tbsp 331 g | 11.68 oz | 0.73 lbs | TF = 0.1032346

(Note: Bowl residue compensation is 1.5%)

Of course, if one has cake yeast and would like to use that, then the dough formulation in that case would be as follows (also for the 12” size):

Flour (100%): Water (65%): CY (0.41666%): Salt (1.25%): Total (166.66666%):

198.6 g  |  7.01 oz | 0.44 lbs 129.09 g  |  4.55 oz | 0.28 lbs 0.83 g | 0.03 oz | 0 lbs | 2.48 g | 0.09 oz | 0.01 lbs | 0.44 tsp | 0.15 tbsp 331 g | 11.68 oz | 0.73 lbs | TF = 0.1032336

(Note: Bowl residue compensation is 1.5%)

As noted above, I used a bowl residue compensation of 1.5% to compensate for minor dough losses in the bowl. To the extent that the final dough weight exceeds 11.5 ounces, it can be trimmed back to 11.5 ounces. In both cases, I used a nominal thickness factor in the Lehmann tool of 0.101709. That would be the number to use in the Lehmann tool if one wants to make a different pizza size. Of course, if one wants to use a smaller thickness factor value in the Lehmann tool in order to more closely replicate the dough thicknesses of the old masters, then that is clearly an option. I might add that 0.83 grams in the cake yeast formulation above translates into about 1/20th of one of those little Fleischmann cake cubes sold in some supermarkets.

I don’t recall whether you mentioned what fermentation time (at room temperature) Amici’s uses. I would think that 6-8 hours would work, and possibly longer.

Peter