Thin and Crispy dough ?

[Jimmy V]

Hi everybody. I am woking on the Thin and Cripsy dough, the first recipe on the recipe page. I used Sir Lancelot High Gluten flour, I think its about 14 %.
I used :
3 1/2 cups flour
3/4 cup warm water  at about 110 degrees
1 Tbl. oil
1 1/2 tso.  ADY
1   1/2 tsp  sugar
1 tsp. salt.
 mixed that for about 3 minutes and placed in fridge. After about 10 hours. I just looked at the dough. It didnt rise at all and it's hard as a rock.  What did I do wrong? Or is this what its supposed to look like ?

[scott r]

Try leaving it out at room temp until it doubles.   It will probably be fine.   You might have just killed off some of the yeast by letting it get into contact with the sugar/salt, or a number of other things.   

[Jimmy V]

Thats what Im going to do.. I remember trying this recipe a long time ago..and the dough is tougher and dryer than a lot of recipes..but the final product was good.

[Mad_Ernie]

Jimmy, out of curiosity, why did you choose the high-gluten flour over an all-purpose flour?

[Jimmy V]

Earni..I chose that because it was listed on the recipe  "Thin Crust Pizza  on the recipe page on this site. I followed the recipe exactly.  I let the dough sit at room temp all day after sitting in th fridge over night.
I rolled it out, but it took me forever.  I just took it out of the oven. The flavor is good.. Its more like a Cracker than a thin-crispy. Its crackery and with air pockets, which I like.  It's just that the dough is REAL hard to roll out. Would an all purpose flour make a difference. or a wetter mix.

[Pete-zza]

Jimmy V,

The recipe you used, at http://www.pizzamaking.com/thincrust.php, calls for a pound (3 1/2 cups) of high-gluten flour and 3/4 cups of water. That combination should produce a hydration of around 38%. However, if you measured out the flour with a heavy hand, you could have ended up with a drier dough. I used the Mass-Volume Conversion Calculator at http://tools.foodsim.com/ and, using the King Arthur Sir Lancelot flour as a proxy for your high-gluten flour (which you did not specify by name), I concluded that you would have to use the Textbook flour Measurement Method to have 3 1/2 cups come to about a pound by weight. The Textbook method is defined as follows:

The Textbook method is recommended to provide consistent and reliable results when measuring flour. It involves stirring the flour in the container to loosen, repeatedly lifting the flour from the container into a measuring cup, and leveling off the flour in the cup with a flat edge.

Having worked with low hydration doughs (around 36%) for cracker-type crusts, I have found that you can roll out the doughs much more easily if you warm up the doughs before rolling them out. I described using a proofing box to warm up cracker-style doughs at Reply 16 at http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,5762.msg49138.html#msg49138. However, other members have used other methods, including a slightly warmed up oven. Member Randy even modified a crock pot for this purpose, as discussed at http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,11697.msg107955.html#msg107955.

It's also possible, although I tend to doubt it, that if you had allowed the dough to ferment in the refrigerator for 24 hours as instructed in the recipe used, the biochemical development of the gluten could have made the dough somewhat easier to roll out. However, it is quite common to ferment cracker-style doughs at room temperature instead of in the refrigerator.

Peter

[Jimmy V]

Thanks Peter, I just poured the flour out of the bag into a measuring cup....till I had 3 1/2 cups.  The dough stayed in the fridge for about 16 hours. It then sat at room temp for several hours.  I would guess I could use a little more hydration.

[Jimmy V]

 Tried  the thin and crispy recipe, came out much better.