Quest for Pizza Pomodoro

[norma427]

The only way to really know your dough is to learn to recognize the signs of enzyme activity.  Clear plastic proofing containers will reveal the enzyme degradation if you learn how to recognize it.  There will be plenty of bubbles, but the slivers of dough that make up the bubbles will start to look wet and a little bit gooey. That's when the dough is properly fermented.  The finished crust tells the story as well. If you end up with a toothy/knobby crust, you took the dough too far.

Scott,

I enjoyed reading your post.  I have watched many different kinds of doughs and wonder how you can determine when the dough is properly fermented if no bubbles form on top of the dough ball?.  I would also like to be able to test what you have posted.  I can see the bubbles forming on the bottom of containers, but have never seen the slivers of dough that look wet and a little gooey.  Could you explain this more?  My whole bottom of my dough ball, if left in a container does look wet, no matter how many bubbles form.

Thanks for your post.

Norma

[scott123]

scott123,

That is a great post !!

Peter

Thanks!  Although I've been picking up enzyme info here and there for years, it was your comment directing me to protease a few months back that really jump started my enzyme research binge. I still have a long way to go (the more you know, the less you know ), but I wanted to share some of the things I picked up recently.

[scott123]

Scott,

I enjoyed reading your post.  I have watched many different kinds of doughs and wonder how you can determine when the dough is properly fermented if no bubbles form on top of the dough ball?.  I would also like to be able to test what you have posted.  I can see the bubbles forming on the bottom of containers, but have never seen the slivers of dough that look wet and a little gooey.  Could you explain this more?  My whole bottom of my dough ball, if left in a container does look wet, no matter how many bubbles form.

Thanks for your post.

Norma

You're welcome Norma.

As you're looking at the bubbles on the bottom, as the fermentation progresses, they'll go from fairly rigid to a tiny bit squiggly and then eventually they'll lose their integrity altogether. The very slight amount of squiggliness is the gooeyness I'm referring to.  And although they do look wet after a brief stint in the fridge, there's a point where the dough becomes noticeably wetter. That's the happy place 

Below are a couple of photos from member Jerrym. Can you see how, on the first photo (day 1), the bubbles are still pretty round (but not perfectly round) and the top of the dough is smooth while, on day 3, the bubbles are less defined and the top of the dough has weak areas where a small bubbles are beginning to show through? These two pics are, imo, basically the difference between just about the right amount of enzyme activity (day 1) and too much (day 3). Day 1 is, to me, the perfect amount of enzyme activity- enough entropy to be digestible/flavorful, but not too much to lose structure.

Norma, I see all the photos you post and I think, without scrutinizing the minutiae as much as I do, you have an excellent feel for when the dough is ready/enzymes have done their thing. I think you might be past the point of worrying about this particular detail.  I think you, like the rest of us, have come to understand the value of at least overnight fermentation (this thread being a rare exception), so that pretty much covers any underfermentation issues and I can't recall seeing you bake up any toothy/knobby crusts, so I think you're fine on the overfermentation side as well.

If memory serves me correctly, Marco mentioned that one of the reasons why digestibility is so important to the Italians is that eating pizza before bed is commonplace. Digestibility has come to a head for me personally due to my predilection for eating a lot at one sitting.  I think these are the only two instances where you're really going to notice the digestibility of a dough. DiFara's, for instance, uses notoriously young dough, and yet no one complains all that much about it sitting heavy in their stomachs.

[Jackie Tran]

Thank you Scott for that in depth explanation.  I will have to read it again over the next few days and see if I can't digest that info.     Does this dough look gooey to you?   Is this what you are referring to? Or is this overfermented?

Chau

[norma427]

You're welcome Norma.

As you're looking at the bubbles on the bottom, as the fermentation progresses, they'll go from fairly rigid to a tiny bit squiggly and then eventually they'll lose their integrity altogether. The very slight amount of squiggliness is the gooeyness I'm referring to.  And although they do look wet after a brief stint in the fridge, there's a point where the dough becomes noticeably wetter. That's the happy place 

Below are a couple of photos from member Jerrym. Can you see how, on the first photo (day 1), the bubbles are still pretty round (but not perfectly round) and the top of the dough is smooth while, on day 3, the bubbles are less defined and the top of the dough has weak areas where a small bubbles are beginning to show through? These two pics are, imo, basically the difference between just about the right amount of enzyme activity (day 1) and too much (day 3). Day 1 is, to me, the perfect amount of enzyme activity- enough entropy to be digestible/flavorful, but not too much to lose structure.

Norma, I see all the photos you post and I think, without scrutinizing the minutiae as much as I do, you have an excellent feel for when the dough is ready/enzymes have done their thing. I think you might be past the point of worrying about this particular detail.  I think you, like the rest of us, have come to understand the value of at least overnight fermentation (this thread being a rare exception), so that pretty much covers any underfermentation issues and I can't recall seeing you bake up any toothy/knobby crusts, so I think you're fine on the overfermentation side as well.

If memory serves me correctly, Marco mentioned that one of the reasons why digestibility is so important to the Italians is that eating pizza before bed is commonplace. Digestibility has come to a head for me personally due to my predilection for eating a lot at one sitting.  I think these are the only two instances where you're really going to notice the digestibility of a dough. DiFara's, for instance, uses notoriously young dough, and yet no one complains all that much about it sitting heavy in their stomachs.

Scott,

I find you explanations interesting, but I still don’t understand how these tests can show when the dough is fermented at the right point to be ready to baked.  I see the pictures you posted of Jerrym’s and I can see what you are posting about, but Jerrym’s dough looks like they are fermentation bubbles on the top also. I can see by those pictures that his dough might be overfermented.

If you look at my pictures of my dough at Reply #1 in this thread, http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,12542.msg119876.html#msg119876 you can see there are no top bubbles and the bottom of the dough wasn’t even wet.  Of course it was a “short-time” dough, but Peter and I still thought this dough might have been overfermented or close to it by how the dough baked. 

I usually take pictures of all my doughs, so anyone can see how they look, both top and bottom right before the bake and other times.  I don’t really think I have a feel for different doughs I make and can’t really tell when they are ready to bake, exactly at the right time.  I have learned dough management, but if you read over my different natural leavening threads, I am not getting the right crust coloration, although I do have decent oven spring and the dough does open well.  There is still something going on in that dough, that I don’t understand.  The top of the dough doesn’t look overfermented and even the bubbles on the bottom of the naturally leavened dough look okay.  I don’t know if you looked at those doughs or not, but if you have time, or are interested in looking at those doughs, you can see what I mean. 

Have you made any doughs that don’t have crust coloration and if you did, what is your theory on what is happening in those doughs? 

I have tried different experiments to see how long different doughs can last and still be able to be baked into a pizza.  What I learned from those experiments was the dough becomes almost limp and honeycombs when opening the dough.  Those doughs also had no crust coloration, although they still were decent in the taste of the crust. 

I have had doughs already that look like they might be overfermented and then reballed them and they were fine.  I don’t know if then the naturally occurring sugars were redistributed or not. 

For me, understanding all that goes into fermentation, and what goes on in the dough over the fermentation period, is still somewhat of a mystery to me, although I do understand some of the concepts.

If you can answer anything about what I posted, I would appreciate it.

Thanks for your ideas, 

Norma

[chickenparm]

Do the container size of where the dough rest/proofs,sometimes have an effect on the size of the bubbles?

It almost seems as if the smaller the container,the bigger the bubbles may form and the higher the dough seems to rise since it has no place to go but UP?

This is going by pictures on here.Just wondering.
 

[norma427]

Do the container size of where the dough rest/proofs,sometimes have an effect on the size of the bubbles?

It almost seems as if the smaller the container,the bigger the bubbles may form and the higher the dough seems to rise since it has no place to go but UP?

This is going by pictures on here.Just wondering.
 

Bill,

I have used different containers and even plastic bags to ferment my doughs.  I haven't seen much of a difference in what the dough is in, when it comes to fermentation.  I could be wrong though.  See if anyone else answers your question.  It is more about finished dough temperature and dough management in my opinion.

Norma

[scott123]

Thank you Scott for that in depth explanation.  I will have to read it again over the next few days and see if I can't digest that info.     Does this dough look gooey to you?   Is this what you are referring to? Or is this overfermented?

Chau

Chau, that's a little more oil than I'm used to working with, which is making the wetness/gooeyness a little hard to detect, but I would say, no, that's not overfermented.

[scott123]

I find you explanations interesting, but I still don’t understand how these tests can show when the dough is fermented at the right point to be ready to baked.  I see the pictures you posted of Jerrym’s and I can see what you are posting about, but Jerrym’s dough looks like they are fermentation bubbles on the top also. I can see by those pictures that his dough might be overfermented.

The first pic (Day 1) has black specs on the top of the dough, but the top is still smooth/not showing any bubbles.  The second pic shows very clearly the bubbles pushing out the top through the obviously weakened gluten.

If you look at my pictures of my dough at Reply #1 in this thread, http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,12542.msg119876.html#msg119876 you can see there are no top bubbles and the bottom of the dough wasn’t even wet.  Of course it was a “short-time” dough, but Peter and I still thought this dough might have been overfermented or close to it by how the dough baked.

Norma, are you sure that link is correct?  The pizza at the beginning of this thread shows absolutely no signs of overfermentation.  It would be physically impossible, imo, to overferment a 6 hour dough.   

I usually take pictures of all my doughs, so anyone can see how they look, both top and bottom right before the bake and other times.  I don’t really think I have a feel for different doughs I make and can’t really tell when they are ready to bake, exactly at the right time.  I have learned dough management, but if you read over my different natural leavening threads, I am not getting the right crust coloration, although I do have decent oven spring and the dough does open well.  There is still something going on in that dough, that I don’t understand.  The top of the dough doesn’t look overfermented and even the bubbles on the bottom of the naturally leavened dough look okay.  I don’t know if you looked at those doughs or not, but if you have time, or are interested in looking at those doughs, you can see what I mean. 

Have you made any doughs that don’t have crust coloration and if you did, what is your theory on what is happening in those doughs?

Predicting coloration is not an easy task.  Sugar is a big player, both added as an ingredient and generated from enzyme activity.    Baking times also have a large impact on coloration.  As you lower the temp and increase the clock, you lose some oven spring, but the crust browns much more evenly. As you decrease the clock and venture toward the Neapolitan realm, even browning goes out the window and you just get the uneven speckling that we all know as leoparding. Are your 'naturally leavened' doughs using sourdough starters?  Sourdough introduces acids and acids are well known to inhibit browning. The acids might also be impacting enzyme activity. I have to admit that although I've done extensive research on non sourdough bread/enzyme chemistry, as you get into the lower pH world of sourdoughs, I'm at a bit of loss.

I have tried different experiments to see how long different doughs can last and still be able to be baked into a pizza.  What I learned from those experiments was the dough becomes almost limp and honeycombs when opening the dough.  Those doughs also had no crust coloration, although they still were decent in the taste of the crust.

In a non sour environment, the longer you ferment, the more residual sugar is generated.  At least, that's what I believe is occurring.  The only time where yeast consumes large/noticeable quantities of sugar is in the high water activity environment of beer making (and that's a lot of yeast and a decent amount of time).  So... overfermented doughs contain a lot of sugar and should color very quickly.  Now, gluten does trap water, so as the gluten begins to fail, the dough will get much more slack, and, when you attempt to bake it, the water will take longer to evaporate, which will delay browning, but once the surface has dried you should have plenty of coloration due to the abundance of sugar.  Not that you'd want that kind of coloration because you'd pay in other ways, like poorer oven spring, an alcohol-y taste and an uneven toothy appearance.

I have had doughs already that look like they might be overfermented and then reballed them and they were fine.  I don’t know if then the naturally occurring sugars were redistributed or not.

In what way did the dough look overfermented?  Was the dough deflated?  Like I said earlier, deflation is not a reliable indicator.  As long as a lot of time hasn't passed and the enzymes haven't had much of a chance to break down the components, doughs can rise/fall, be re-balled without care.  Re-balling will generate gluten, which, imo, may not be a good thing, but it's not impacting fermentation.  The negative traits that one sees from overfermentation (toothy appearance, less spring, uneven coloring, alcohol-y taste, sticky/hard to handle dough) are not a result of yeast/CO2/volume, but of enzymes eventually laying waste to everything in sight. 

Beyond visual indicators, there's also smell.  As the dough ferments, on the yeast side, you can smell the alcohol, but enzyme generated sugar will give off a sweet smell as well.  I switched to opaque containers a while back, so that's what I rely on- to an extent.  If you work with clear containers enough and vigorously control the variables (flour brand, yeast quantity, dough temp, proofing temp, proofing time, hydration, kneading time/intensity, etc),  the enzyme activity and yeast activity will track in such a way that you can use the yeast activity indicators to tell you when a dough is ready.  In other words, if the enzymes atrophy a dough exactly the way I want it (digestible but still structurally viable) and, at that magic moment the dough had doubled, if I do everything the same the next time, I can wait until the dough doubles and be reasonably certain that the enzyme activity will be where I want to be.

At times, I sort of miss the training wheels of clear containers, but the stackable opaque containers I use are much wider (less contact with the side/easier to remove the dough) and have no issues whatsoever with releasing pent up gas, so it's a trade off I'm willing to make.

[norma427]

Norma, are you sure that link is correct?  The pizza at the beginning of this thread shows absolutely no signs of overfermentation.  It would be physically impossible, imo, to overferment a 6 hour dough.   

Predicting coloration is not an easy task.  Sugar is a big player, both added as an ingredient and generated from enzyme activity.    Baking times also have a large impact on coloration.  As you lower the temp and increase the clock, you lose some oven spring, but the crust browns much more evenly. As you decrease the clock and venture toward the Neapolitan realm, even browning goes out the window and you just get the uneven speckling that we all know as leoparding. Are your 'naturally leavened' doughs using sourdough starters?  Sourdough introduces acids and acids are well known to inhibit browning. The acids might also be impacting enzyme activity. I have to admit that although I've done extensive research on non sourdough bread/enzyme chemistry, as you get into the lower pH world of sourdoughs, I'm at a bit of loss.

In a non sour environment, the longer you ferment, the more residual sugar is generated.  At least, that's what I believe is occurring.  The only time where yeast consumes large/noticeable quantities of sugar is in the high water activity environment of beer making (and that's a lot of yeast and a decent amount of time).  So... overfermented doughs contain a lot of sugar and should color very quickly.  Now, gluten does trap water, so as the gluten begins to fail, the dough will get much more slack, and, when you attempt to bake it, the water will take longer to evaporate, which will delay browning, but once the surface has dried you should have plenty of coloration due to the abundance of sugar.  Not that you'd want that kind of coloration because you'd pay in other ways, like poorer oven spring, an alcohol-y taste and an uneven toothy appearance.

In what way did the dough look overfermented?  Was the dough deflated?  Like I said earlier, deflation is not a reliable indicator.  As long as a lot of time hasn't passed and the enzymes haven't had much of a chance to break down the components, doughs can rise/fall, be re-balled without care.  Re-balling will generate gluten, which, imo, may not be a good thing, but it's not impacting fermentation.  The negative traits that one sees from overfermentation (toothy appearance, less spring, uneven coloring, alcohol-y taste, sticky/hard to handle dough) are not a result of yeast/CO2/volume, but of enzymes eventually laying waste to everything in sight. 

Beyond visual indicators, there's also smell.  As the dough ferments, on the yeast side, you can smell the alcohol, but enzyme generated sugar will give off a sweet smell as well.  I switched to opaque containers a while back, so that's what I rely on- to an extent.  If you work with clear containers enough and vigorously control the variables (flour brand, yeast quantity, dough temp, proofing temp, proofing time, hydration, kneading time/intensity, etc),  the enzyme activity and yeast activity will track in such a way that you can use the yeast activity indicators to tell you when a dough is ready.  In other words, if the enzymes atrophy a dough exactly the way I want it (digestible but still structurally viable) and, at that magic moment the dough had doubled, if I do everything the same the next time, I can wait until the dough doubles and be reasonably certain that the enzyme activity will be where I want to be.

Scott,

To answer your questions to your different observations.  The link was correct for the dough I made in this thread.  In my opinion, it is possible to overferment a dough in 6 hrs.  This dough had a lot of IDY added, and even though this dough should have been ready to baked into a pizza much sooner, I believe I did overferment the dough by the feel of the dough when opening it.  There were many bubbles in the dough and when I picked it up to open by hand, there were many honeycombs in the dough.  I almost created holes in the dough when opening it. I know the dough doesn't look like it was overfermented.  I had no visual indicators that the dough in this thread was overfermented, until I started to open the dough.

I agree predicting coloration isn’t an easy task.  I have learned that there can still be enough residual sugar in the dough enough to have oven spring and good handling properties, but the doughs still can have problems with coloration.  I even have tried lowering my bake temperatures (much lower) and baked longer and there still was oven spring, but not much more coloration.  All the doughs I am having problems with in terms of coloration are sourdoughs, made with different starters.  I am using poolishes in different amounts in my sourdoughs.  My opinion right now about the poolish doughs is that the biological activity in the poolish doughs consumes so much sugar and then leaves too little for good coloration. This could be what Professor Calvel talks about suffering from limited Maillard and caramelization reactions. Professor Calvel also states “If it too acidic to begin with, then that will lower the final pH at the time of baking.” and “The presence of an appropriate amount of residual sugars in the dough at the time of baking is extremely important” and “Other findings indicate that the smaller the original quantity of yeast in the dough, the greater the percentage increase in cell numbers during the fermentation, with all other conditions being held constant  This is not surprising given the fact that at the lower yeast level, the competition for nutrients is far less than at the higher yeast levels. Thus, each yeast cell has access or at least the opportunity for access to greater food supplies during fermentation.” I have tried adding honey and malt powder without much success to the poolish sourdoughs for crust coloration.  Non of my sourdoughs have a sour taste in the crust or a real alcoholy smell in the dough balls.  Sourdoughs are harder to understand.  I have baked some of the same sourdoughs in my friend Steve’s (Ev) oven and you are right there doesn’t seem to be any problems with crust coloration in a WFO.  The higher bake temperatures do then cause leoparding.  I did have one sourdough baked in Steve’s oven, that didn’t show leoparding but did brown nicely.  These are some reasons why sourdoughs are so hard to understand.

Thanks for you ideas and observations,

Norma

[Pete-zza]

Norma,

Before I ever attempted to make an emergency dough, I tried to learn as much as I could about such doughs and what to expect from them. So, as a result, I can't recall ever letting an emergency dough go past its prime and overferment. However, I believe that it is possible to overferment a dough that has a far above average amount of yeast in it, in your case almost 1.9% (IDY), which is more than double what one would ordinarily use to make an emergency dough (along with warmer water). Tom's advice to pizza operators is, in general, conservative in nature, no doubt because he does not want to tell operators to do something that produces failed or unsatisfactory results. In the case of emergency doughs, his advice is to use the emergency dough fairly promptly, and not to let it sit around too long. Typical of Tom's advice on emergency doughs is the advice given at the PMQ Think Tank forum, at http://thinktank.pmq.com/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=4302&p=23372&hilit=#p23372. The advice given in the link I previously provided (the text of which also appears at http://www.pmq.com/mag/200708/lehmann.php) also gives conservative advice on the time to use the emergency dough.

Also, in my experience, different doughs can exhibit different signs of overfermentation or overproofing. Most professionals tend to work with only one type of dough, or maybe two types of dough, and, over time learn through repeated practice and experience just about everything there is to know about the doughs, including when they are ready to use. On this forum, where people make all kinds of doughs and where they often jump around from one type of dough to another, including both room temperature fermented doughs and cold fermented doughs, and using commercial and natural leavening systems in both starter and preferment quantities, it takes a lot more time to learn the behavior of the different doughs and to be able to spot the signals that tell one when to use the dough for best results and performance. That is why I think one should be careful not to try to overgeneralize on the subject.

Peter

[Jackie Tran]

Chau, that's a little more oil than I'm used to working with, which is making the wetness/gooeyness a little hard to detect, but I would say, no, that's not overfermented.

I do use a bit of oil to oil the sides of the container but the top of the dough has no oil or bench flour on it.   It has that wet appearance I believe you were referring to. 

Thanks for the info.    As far as not being able to overferment an emergency dough.  I agree, with Norma & Peter and think that it can be done.  As Peter mention, if there is enough (or excess yeast) it seems like a dough could be overfermented even in a short amount of time.   Here is a dough made with 50%+ starter and warm proofed.  Bake about 2 hours after the dough was made.  The crumb structure has that toothy appearance.  Taste was a bit on the tang side but not too sour if I remember correctly.  Was this dough perhaps overfermented? I didn't think so, but it seem to have that toothiness in the crumb structure. 

reply #52,#53
http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,11015.40.html

[norma427]

Norma,

Before I ever attempted to make an emergency dough, I tried to learn as much as I could about such doughs and what to expect from them. So, as a result, I can't recall ever letting an emergency dough go past its prime and overferment. However, I believe that it is possible to overferment a dough that has a far above average amount of yeast in it, in your case almost 1.9% (IDY), which is more than double what one would ordinarily use to make an emergency dough (along with warmer water). Tom's advice to pizza operators is, in general, conservative in nature, no doubt because he does not want to tell operators to do something that produces failed or unsatisfactory results. In the case of emergency doughs, his advice is to use the emergency dough fairly promptly, and not to let it sit around too long. Typical of Tom's advice on emergency doughs is the advice given at the PMQ Think Tank forum, at http://thinktank.pmq.com/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=4302&p=23372&hilit=#p23372. The advice given in the link I previously provided (the text of which also appears at http://www.pmq.com/mag/200708/lehmann.php) also gives conservative advice on the time to use the emergency dough.

Also, in my experience, different doughs can exhibit different signs of overfermentation or overproofing. Most professionals tend to work with only one type of dough, or maybe two types of dough, and, over time learn through repeated practice and experience just about everything there is to know about the doughs, including when they are ready to use. On this forum, where people make all kinds of doughs and where they often jump around from one type of dough to another, including both room temperature fermented doughs and cold fermented doughs, and using commercial and natural leavening systems in both starter and preferment quantities, it takes a lot more time to learn the behavior of the different doughs and to be able to spot the signals that tell one when to use the dough for best results and performance. That is why I think one should be careful not to try to overgeneralize on the subject.

Peter

Peter,

Thanks for referencing the links from Tom Lehmann.  I haven’t made any other emergency doughs that I can recall, so my experience in seeing the signs of overfermentation is non-existent  I will watch the dough closer tomorrow. 

Norma

[hotsawce]

So I tried making pizza pomodoro today. 13 x17" cookie sheet I believe.

I put it on what I  "thought" was the middle rack, at 500, but apparently it wasn't middle enough. The bottom of the pie cooked to well done in about 12 minutes, far less than the 25...but the top was still not quite done.

[norma427]

So I tried making pizza pomodoro today. 13 x17" cookie sheet I believe.

I put it on what I  "thought" was the middle rack, at 500, but apparently it wasn't middle enough. The bottom of the pie cooked to well done in about 12 minutes, far less than the 25...but the top was still not quite done.

hotsawce,

If you read Peter’s post at Reply # 29 http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,12542.msg119953.html#msg119953  you can see that Peter thinks my dough was overfemented and that is why it took so long for my bake and for my pie to get any crust coloration. 

If you see what I answered at Reply # 32 http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,12542.msg119962.html#msg119962  you will see I think my yeast contributed to how long I had to ferment my dough.  I am going to try this kind of pie again tomorrow to see if there is anymore rise in the crust.  My pie came out too thin.   

I think you will have to play around with your oven set-up and see what works best for you, if you want to try this kind of pizza again.  How did your pizza turn out in terms of taste and what kind of toppings did you use?  Did your dough ferment quickly?

I think this formula will have to be experimented with a little more, to see what actually works.

Good to hear your tried out the formula.   

Norma

[hotsawce]

Well, it was a spur of the moment thing so it was loaded with IDY. I actually had to punch it down at room temp after an hour and a half. Was to the thickness factor you used, but it didn't seem too thin.

Flavor was fairly good...used canned tomatoes, pecorino, olive oil, and sea salt. The tomatoes I used, though, were not good. Tuttorosso in the blue can...heard good things but the Ninas I normally use blow them out of the water.

This pie has a lot of potential I think. Some more attention to the dough, better tomatoes and tweaking the cooking set up (I think i need to go up a rack) will make it shine. What thickness factor should I go for next? The hard part is stretching even in a 13 x 18 pan! Some parts were stuck to the bottom....and I oiled the pan fairly liberally (though not really excessively.

The pecorino was very, very flavorful....loved the combo. Probably a little too much tomatoes, but I think next time I'll nail it. Next time I think I'm doing a half and half, other half being marinara with oregano and garlic ( though I'm not sure when to toss the garlic on without burning it.

Definitely a winner with some work; easy and great for crowds or a quick snack, pretty good at room temp.

[scott123]

In my opinion, it is possible to overferment a dough in 6 hrs.  This dough had a lot of IDY added, and even though this dough should have been ready to baked into a pizza much sooner, I believe I did overferment the dough by the feel of the dough when opening it.  There were many bubbles in the dough and when I picked it up to open by hand, there were many honeycombs in the dough.  I almost created holes in the dough when opening it. I know the dough doesn't look like it was overfermented.  I had no visual indicators that the dough in this thread was overfermented, until I started to open the dough.

Norma, I think it's possible we might be have different definitions for overfermentation.  A dough with an excessive number of bubbles/honeycomb structure is not overfermented. An excess of bubbles in a young dough is a completely reversible phenomenon.  Deflated dough looks like it's been ravaged, but, trust me, it's barely damaged.  Extreme quantities of yeast generate lots of volume/CO2, but CO2 doesn't inflict all that much damage on gluten. All the flours that are used for pizza (AP through 14%) can handle any volumetric expansion/deflation/CO2 that typical quantities of   yeast (up to 3%) can throw at it during a 6 hour time frame. With the higher protein flours we work with, excessive volume/bubbles can overwork the gluten a bit, but they'll never do noticeable damage. One punch down later, and, presto, the gluten is back in business. It is my firm belief that overfermentation involves only that damage that is irreversible.  If the damage can be reversed, it's not overfermentation. Yeast activity only produces one type of irreversible damage- the production of alcohol. Alcohol is a long term byproduct. No matter how extreme one is about adding yeast to dough, it will never generate that much alcohol in 6 hours.  It's a physical impossibility.

If one wanted to get caught up in semantics, technically speaking, fermentation is defined as producing alcohol, and yeast does create alcohol, so one could say overfermentation translates into too much alcohol.  In bread, though, we know overfermentation has a different meaning. By the time alcohol reaches a sufficient quantity to impact flavor negatively, the protease has already done it's damage. Because of the accelerated enzyme atrophy clock, CO2/alcohol production/yeast activity are trivial in the fermentation equation. For years bakers have looked at rapidly expanding doughs and incorrectly assumed that deflated dough marked substantial damage/impact both to the gluten and the residual sugar, when, in reality, neither is really affected. Yeast certainly looks like it's doing a lot, but it's all just a lot of hot air, I mean a lot of  hot CO2   Enzymes are the bad mama jamas, and in home doughs, they work slowly.  Without enzyme supplementation, you cannot significantly speed up the clock of enzyme destruction.  Cold fermentation only gives enzymes a slight edge. Discernible enzyme atrophy will always take longer than 6 hours. Enzyme atrophy is a marathon, never a sprint.

Put another way, long before the alcohol content in a dough becomes impalatable, the gluten will have been atrophied by enzymes and begin to lose it's structure. Protease is the gluten killer. Protease is the overfermentor. There's not a home made dough on this planet with enough protease to do noticeable damage in 6 hours. Not a one. If a 6 hour dough rises so much that it begins to deflate/fall, all you have to do is punch it down and the gluten will have strength/air holding capacity again.  If you do something incredibly extreme like kneading a dough for hours or  punching it down/re-balling it every few minutes, sure, you'll damage the gluten and it'll get toothy/knobby, but gluten overmanipulation and overfermentation are not the same.

Summing up, overfermentation, imo, is:

Gluten atrophy
Starch atrophy (excess of sugar)
Abundance of alcohol

Overfermentation is not:

Too much volume/deflation
Sugar depletion (can't happen)
Overkneading

And gluten atrophy/starch atrophy/discernible alcohol cannot occur in 6 hours with the types of flour/levels of yeast we use.

[scott123]

Here is a dough made with 50%+ starter and warm proofed.  Bake about 2 hours after the dough was made.  The crumb structure has that toothy appearance.  Taste was a bit on the tang side but not too sour if I remember correctly.  Was this dough perhaps overfermented? I didn't think so, but it seem to have that toothiness in the crumb structure. 

reply #52,#53
http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,11015.40.html

Chau, I took the term 'toothy' from you, but I think somewhere along the way, our definitions might have parted ways 

The rim in reply #52 is strong, smooth and intact and shows absolutely no signs of gluten degradation/bumps/toothiness.  Here's an example of what I believe to be toothiness:

http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,10514.msg93760.html#msg93760

Another indicator that usually accompanies toothiness/overfermentation is a translucent quality on the tops of the bumps where the gluten has thinned out.  I'm not seeing too much in this particular example, so the overfermentation isn't extreme, but it's still a bit toothy none the less.

[norma427]

Well, it was a spur of the moment thing so it was loaded with IDY. I actually had to punch it down at room temp after an hour and a half. Was to the thickness factor you used, but it didn't seem too thin.

Flavor was fairly good...used canned tomatoes, pecorino, olive oil, and sea salt. The tomatoes I used, though, were not good. Tuttorosso in the blue can...heard good things but the Ninas I normally use blow them out of the water.

This pie has a lot of potential I think. Some more attention to the dough, better tomatoes and tweaking the cooking set up (I think i need to go up a rack) will make it shine. What thickness factor should I go for next? The hard part is stretching even in a 13 x 18 pan! Some parts were stuck to the bottom....and I oiled the pan fairly liberally (though not really excessively.

The pecorino was very, very flavorful....loved the combo. Probably a little too much tomatoes, but I think next time I'll nail it. Next time I think I'm doing a half and half, other half being marinara with oregano and garlic ( though I'm not sure when to toss the garlic on without burning it.

Definitely a winner with some work; easy and great for crowds or a quick snack, pretty good at room temp.

hotsawce,

The dough was made to be a “short dough”, meaning it was made to be made quickly.  I think the pie also has potential, if someone likes fairly thin pie, and want to make them in one day. 

I don’t know about thickness factor as of today.  My dough didn’t rise enough while in the oven, so I will have to do more experiments. 

Your choice of toppings sound good.  I think the taste of the toppings is what makes this kind of pie a winner, but with enough tweaking, maybe there can also be a good taste in the crust.  The slice I had at Sullivan St. Bakery, even eaten cold was really good.

Thanks for going into detail about what you did. 

Norma

[norma427]

Norma, I think it's possible we might be have different definitions for overfermentation.  A dough with an excessive number of bubbles/honeycomb structure is not overfermented. An excess of bubbles in a young dough is a completely reversible phenomenon.  Deflated dough looks like it's been ravaged, but, trust me, it's barely damaged.  Extreme quantities of yeast generate lots of volume/CO2, but CO2 doesn't inflict all that much damage on gluten. All the flours that are used for pizza (AP through 14%) can handle any volumetric expansion/deflation/CO2 that typical quantities of   yeast (up to 3%) can throw at it during a 6 hour time frame. With the higher protein flours we work with, excessive volume/bubbles can overwork the gluten a bit, but they'll never do noticeable damage. One punch down later, and, presto, the gluten is back in business. It is my firm belief that overfermentation involves only that damage that is irreversible.  If the damage can be reversed, it's not overfermentation. Yeast activity only produces one type of irreversible damage- the production of alcohol. Alcohol is a long term byproduct. No matter how extreme one is about adding yeast to dough, it will never generate that much alcohol in 6 hours.  It's a physical impossibility.

If one wanted to get caught up in semantics, technically speaking, fermentation is defined as producing alcohol, and yeast does create alcohol, so one could say overfermentation translates into too much alcohol.  In bread, though, we know overfermentation has a different meaning. By the time alcohol reaches a sufficient quantity to impact flavor negatively, the protease has already done it's damage. Because of the accelerated enzyme atrophy clock, CO2/alcohol production/yeast activity are trivial in the fermentation equation. For years bakers have looked at rapidly expanding doughs and incorrectly assumed that deflated dough marked substantial damage/impact both to the gluten and the residual sugar, when, in reality, neither is really affected. Yeast certainly looks like it's doing a lot, but it's all just a lot of hot air, I mean a lot of  hot CO2   Enzymes are the bad mama jamas, and in home doughs, they work slowly.  Without enzyme supplementation, you cannot significantly speed up the clock of enzyme destruction.  Cold fermentation only gives enzymes a slight edge. Discernible enzyme atrophy will always take longer than 6 hours. Enzyme atrophy is a marathon, never a sprint.

Put another way, long before the alcohol content in a dough becomes impalatable, the gluten will have been atrophied by enzymes and begin to lose it's structure. Protease is the gluten killer. Protease is the overfermentor. There's not a home made dough on this planet with enough protease to do noticeable damage in 6 hours. Not a one. If a 6 hour dough rises so much that it begins to deflate/fall, all you have to do is punch it down and the gluten will have strength/air holding capacity again.  If you do something incredibly extreme like kneading a dough for hours or  punching it down/re-balling it every few minutes, sure, you'll damage the gluten and it'll get toothy/knobby, but gluten overmanipulation and overfermentation are not the same.

Summing up, overfermentation, imo, is:

Gluten atrophy
Starch atrophy (excess of sugar)
Abundance of alcohol

Overfermentation is not:

Too much volume/deflation
Sugar depletion (can't happen)
Overkneading

And gluten atrophy/starch atrophy/discernible alcohol cannot occur in 6 hours with the types of flour/levels of yeast we use.

Scott123,

Maybe we are on different pages for overfermentation of a “short-time” dough.  I haven’t made any before, so really I can't comment if I ever had overfermentation until this recent dough.  It didn’t look overfermented and didn’t need any punch down, but what I learned from doing experiments with long time fermented doughs, was the dough wanted to almost fall apart when opening the dough and also did feel like there were honeycombs in the dough.   That is how this recent dough felt when opening the dough.  If I wasn’t careful, I would have torn this dough in different places.  I should have taken a picture of the dough after it was opened, before I placed the toppings on.  Then you could have seen what the dough looked like.  If you look on the bottom crust pictures I posted, you can see the bottom crust wasn't even in different places.

I appreciate your insight.

Norma