Neo-Neopolitan.....way too easy....very, very good

[fazzari]

I was looking through some cook books the other day and ran into this Neo-Neopolitan Pizza from Peter Reinhart's "Artisan Breads Everyday".  This is a variation from the recipe given in "American Pie".  What caught my eye were three things in particular:  1) this crust has 71% hydration  2)  total mix time is 3 to 4 minutes  and 3) the use of a teaspoon of oil to help ball the finished dough.

The recipe:
Unbleached bread flour                    100.00%
Salt                                                 2.00
Instant yeast                                      .44
Sugar or honey (optional)                     4.2
Water                                              71.00
Olive oil (optional)                                4.2

Combine all ingredients in mixing bowl.  Using paddle attachment mix on lowest speed for 1 minute.  Let dough rest for 5 minutes to hydrate the flour.  Switch to dough hook and mix on medium low for 2 to 3 minutes.  Spread 1 teaspoon of olive oil on work surface and transfer the dough here.  Do a quick stretch and fold.  Divide the dough into appropriate weights and ball.  Refrigerate ovenight and up to 4 days . 

The following is a pizza made with a 10 ounce dough piece, which was rerigerated for 18 hours.  This pizza is about 13 inches wide.


John

   

[Pete-zza]

John,

That is a nice looking pizza.

Since many of our members do not know how to work off of just baker's percents, can you provide the actual weights and/or volume amounts you actually used?

Peter

[Jet_deck]

What was the bake time and temp?  Was it cooked on a perferated screen?

[chickenparm]

That looks great! Love it!
 

[fazzari]

This is the recipe I used to make 5 ten ounce dough balls:

Flour                                            27.60 oz
Salt                                                 .55 oz
Instant yeast                                     .12 oz
Malted Barley syrup                            1.15 oz
Water                                             19.6 oz
Olive oil                                            1.15 oz

The pizzas are baked in a 580 degree oven for about 5 minutes.  They were started on a screen and finished on the deck, because I had no experience with this dough and didn't know how fast it would brown especially considering the added sugar.  The following is a pie I baked today from the same batch.  It was refrigerated for 42 hours, reballed and set out at room temp for 2 hours.
John

[Essen1]

This is the recipe I used to make 5 ten ounce dough balls:

Flour                                            27.60 oz
Salt                                                 .55 oz
Instant yeast                                     .12 oz
Malted Barley syrup                            1.15 oz
Water                                             19.6 oz
Olive oil                                            1.15 oz

The pizzas are baked in a 580 degree oven for about 5 minutes.  They were started on a screen and finished on the deck, because I had no experience with this dough and didn't know how fast it would brown especially considering the added sugar.  The following is a pie I baked today from the same batch.  It was refrigerated for 42 hours, reballed and set out at room temp for 2 hours.
John

John,

I'm curious as to why you reballed them? Were they overfermenting after 42 hrs or expanding at a faster rate where you felt a reballing is necessary?

Pies look great, btw. 

[fazzari]

Mike
In his book, Reinhart instructs the baker to reball the dough as part of the process...so technically I'm just following his instructions.  But, I do observe that reballing takes out the big air bubbles, the ones that would tend to make the big black blisters on the top side of a pizza after baking.  I'm going to try yet another dough ball today and see how it does.

John

[Pete-zza]

John,

Thank you for completing the picture on the Reinhart dough formulation. I have added that formulation to the collection of non-Lehmann NY style dough formulations at http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,11860.msg110290.html#msg110290.

Peter

[Essen1]

Mike
In his book, Reinhart instructs the baker to reball the dough as part of the process...so technically I'm just following his instructions.  But, I do observe that reballing takes out the big air bubbles, the ones that would tend to make the big black blisters on the top side of a pizza after baking.  I'm going to try yet another dough ball today and see how it does.

John

John,

I'm familiar with Reinhart but not with this particular book so thanks for the clarification. I usually tend to stay away from re-balling but if it works, even better.

[fazzari]

The following are a couple of pies I baked with the same batch of dough....these were refrigerated for about 66 hours.  This time I reballed them and only let them set for 1 hour...the reason being, this dough gets thin real real fast...and I really much prefer more bite in my pizza.  These pizzas are only stretched to about 11 and a half inches...they baked in under 5 minutes.  These are by far the best tasting pizzas of the batch...in fact, I rate them fabulous!!!  Can tomorrow's last pizza improve more?....we'll see.  By the way, I again started them on a screen, and then finished them on the quarry tiles.
John

[Jet_deck]

They look excellent, plus I could cook the 11" pizza in my chiminea.

[fazzari]

Here's my final pizza from this experiment.  100 hours refrigeration.  Took out and reballed.  Let set 45 minutes. Stretched to almost 12 inches....started on a screen, finished on the tiles...about 5 minutes at 580 degrees.  The taste of this crust excited me.....the difference in flavor from Monday until today (Thursday) cannot be described with words...the dough had a nutty flavor if that makes any sense.  For myself, this crust is better a little thicker than a little thinner.  Another thing I learned from reading Reinharts book, was that it might be better to place your stone or tiles above the middle of your oven so that you can use the ceiling of your oven to provide heat.  This worked really well in my oven...in that I got a nice brown color and retained tenderness.  This method is so easy and the results so good, that it will definitely be a keeper, in fact, it will be my goto recipe.
John

[dms]

I'm using what amounts to this formula (though I arrived at it by experimentation, and not from a recipe.)

I do

100 %   high gluten flour (I'm using BSM's Bouncer, 13.8%, bromated, mostly)
72 to 74% h20
1.5% salt,
about 0.2 % IDY (there's more variation here than I'd like: my scale isn't accurate at this level)
Aim for a 320 gram dough ball for a 12-13" pie

No sugar, but I lightly coat the balls in olive oil before they go in the fridge.   they pick up four or five grams of oil doing that.  I'm also kneading a bit less that is called for.  I usually uses the dough at 48 hours, but I've used it at 336 (two weeks!) and it's good.  Rather extensible, at that point, and past its prime. 

[norma427]

John,

Your pizza sure looks delicious!    What you described about the nutty flavor was interesting.  I never made a pizza that I thought I had nutty flavor.  Great experiments! Thanks for posting your formula and pictures.

Norma

[fazzari]

I've been intrigued with this recipe and method and have been experimenting every week.  This batch of dough has no oil, except for the teaspoon used to scale and ball the dough.  I made 6 10 ounce dough balls, and have been using them throughout the week.  The following pictures show a dough which has fermented for 110 hours, was reballed, let set 2 hours, formed dressed and baked.  This pizza was baked on a 535 degree deck (no screen), and was loved by all.  It was crispy, tender and delicious.

John

[fazzari]

And now I have both an observation and a question?  I've read a ton of stuff on this website, and as far as reballing dough, it seems that the consensus is it should not be done.  Yet Peter Reinhart makes this one of the steps in making this neo-neopolitan dough.  For experimental purposes this week, I made a pizza without reballing to see what kind of difference it made with this recipe.  The pizza was tough and very chewy...it just didn't have that good mouth appeal...in fact, I thought the problem was the lack of oil in this recipe.  But the next day, I took out another dough, reballed it, and made pizza like normal and the tender, crispiness was back.  Any thoughts on why this might be??

John
 

[Jackie Tran]

High hydration doughs can and do tolerate a reballing step.  I do it all the time with great results.    Most members do not use a high hydration dough therefore the dough neither requires it or tolerates it.

Reballing always builds strength into dough and can actually help hold up the crumb structure giving a more airy rim if the dough is wet and requires it.   If using a high hydration dough, and you haven't kneaded enough thus built enough gluten into the dough, and then you skip the reballing process, then the crumb suffers by being flat and not rising as much.  This can definitely give the impression of a denser crumb but it should still be tender not chewy.

Chewy and tough comes from overkneading (overgluten development) and/or reballing (additional gluten strengthening effect).

Chau

[fazzari]

I'm still having fun experimenting with Reinhart's neo-neopolitan dough.  In his book "Artisan Breads Every Day" he says that this version always gets the most votes for favorite in his pizza classes around the country.  I've been doing most experimentation in my deck ovens at work, but then I realized that they are running cooler this time of year....so I tried some in my home oven where I can get the quarry stone up to 620 degrees.  What a difference....now I'm not afraid of getting my dough too thin because the extra heat bakes them just fine.  The following pizza is made from a 10 ounce dough ball, it has been refrigerated for 6 days, is 12 inches in diameter and is absolutely delicious!!
John

[norma427]

I'm still having fun experimenting with Reinhart's neo-neopolitan dough.  In his book "Artisan Breads Every Day" he says that this version always gets the most votes for favorite in his pizza classes around the country.  I've been doing most experimentation in my deck ovens at work, but then I realized that they are running cooler this time of year....so I tried some in my home oven where I can get the quarry stone up to 620 degrees.  What a difference....now I'm not afraid of getting my dough too thin because the extra heat bakes them just fine.  The following pizza is made from a 10 ounce dough ball, it has been refrigerated for 6 days, is 12 inches in diameter and is absolutely delicious!!
John

John,

Glad to hear you still are having fun experimenting with Reinhart’s neo-neopolitan dough.  Your crumb look delicious!  I can imagine what a great taste your crust had with a 6 day cold ferment.  Good job on your experiments. 

Norma

[DannyG]

Fazzari, would you tell us how much you work the dough when you reball? Also, how are you storing the dough balls in the frig?