Pain A L'Ancienne Pizza

[sacwoodpusher]

OK, CA style or not, I am Californian....

Makes 2 medium pizza's with lots of bubbles....DO NOT POP THESE!!!!!!:

At midnight, the night before, mix together:

1 cups ice water
3/4 tsp instant yeast

In the KitchenAid, with the doughhook, mix:

3 cups flour (I usually use AP, unbleached, if possible)....use as local as possible
1 1/4 tsp salt

Add water all at once.

Mix about 5 minutes or until dough cleans bowl.
Remove the dough hook, cover the mixing bowl with plastic, and refrigerate.

Remove the dough from the refrigerator at about 4 o'clock PM. Separate dough into 2 balls, put each ball under a bowl.

At 6:00 PM, you can begin shaping into pizza's. This type of dough is a little uncooperative. Top sparingly so that the dough can shine. Crushed tomatoes, garlic, fresh herbs, and mozzarella...and a little olive oil.

[Pete-zza]

sacwoodpusher,

It looks like you are using a scaled down version of Peter Reinhart's recipe for pain a l'ancienne for a pizza application as given, for example, at http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/2723/pain-lancienne-recipe.

As you will note from the recent article on yeast at http://www.bakingbusiness.com/News/News%20Home/Features/2010/12/Ingr%20RD%20Yeast.aspx?NewsLetter=true, dry yeast, including instant dry yeast (IDY), is sensitive to cold water (see, also, Tom Lehmann's post at the PMQ Think Tank at http://thinktank.pmq.com/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=6778&p=44430&hilit=#p44454). There are some newer forms of IDY that can better tolerate cold water but they are not yet available at the retail level. You will also note that the Reinhart recipe calls for combining the IDY with the flour and salt in the mixer bowl. The flour buffers the IDY from the potentially harmful effects of the ice cold water. Next time, you might want to add the IDY to the flour before adding the ice cold water.

Peter

[sacwoodpusher]

Thanks.

For some reason, I started making bread dough, and putting it into the fridge a couple years ago. I think I started doing this for a different reason....because if I left the dough on the counter, and if it was really full, the bread crawled onto the counter before I could get home from work.

Later, I saw the recipe......and yes, I use his recipe, kind of. In truth, I measure out flour, yeast, and salt.......and then I dump in water until things look right. I know of no way, however, to communicate this.

I just bought a baking scale, so that I can communicate what I do.......in forums and on my blog.

I seek bread with big holes in it.......real chewy stuff that has to be dunked into lamb stew or gravy. As I burnt my challah today, it is time for some ciabatta....using this technique. I'll kick off a batch before bed......and bake it tomorrow. YUM!

I'll try to take pictures showing technique and crumb.