Thanks for the insightful comments guys. I have learned a great deal from fellow member comments so please keep them coming. Here is an update as to where I am in my journey of home pizza making.
In the absence of better tools (a wood burning oven and perhaps a better mixer come to mind), I have perfected every facet of the dough making process. The lone caveat being perfection was specifically achieved for me. For my tastes with my available tools. I have literally tried every known combination of process steps, hydration levels, oil/no oil, sugar/no sugar, malt/no malt, preferment/no preferment, fresh yeast/IDY, etc. Hopefully you get the point.
I have challenged conventional wisdom at every juncture with all available ingredients and with all known procedural steps, irrespective of time and cost. The fun part for me was I did not know exactly where I would end up. Once I surpassed the Patsy Pizzeria standard I was in no-man's land. So it wasn't as if I was rigging the experiments in any one direction to produce a particular outcome I wanted. I really didn't know what I didn't know. The goal of producing the most robust handling dough and most flavorful crust was my goal. I humbly state that I have principally achieved that target.
So the current Raquel is the very best American based dough I can produce. If there is some other magical combination of ingredients out there, I couldn't find it after months of assiduously detailing every effort and changing a single variable at a time. I have developed a new appreciation for the phrase hand-crafted as a result.
The same level of bravado cannot be articulated with respect to toppings however. I have not experimented anywhere near to the same extent I have with dough, cheese, and tomatoes. But the time for inventing flavorful new topping combinations is upon me. Until I move to the next level of baking with a wood burning oven of some sort or mixing dough with a fork mixer, I have little left to accomplish other than in the area of toppings.
Bill/SFNM brings up a valid point. The prosciutto did taste a little like shoe leather - which is exactly how my Virginia bride likes it. It reminds her of Country Ham which is a favorite of her Danville, Virginia based upbringing. I am originally a Yankee so heavily salted shoe leather is lost on me but it makes her real happy so who am I to argue. Come to think of it, small chunks of Country Ham is worth trying. I've not heard of anyone putting it on pie before but who says we have to stay within the lines when it comes to home pizza making?
David brings up another good point with respect to EVOO or the lack thereof on Raquel. My family prefers a somewhat dry pie. When oil is added they feel Raquel is being moved closer to chain pizza instead of the utterly light crust they have come to love. To date, I have not pressure tested my taste testers on things like a splash of EVOO and chopped up prosciutto much but then again the time is now. I need to be every bit as creative with toppings as I have with developing every other facet of Raquel.
I do have another goal which is somewhat different than most home pizza makers. It is simply designing the appropriate macro-nutrient composition of my offerings so that the bloat which typically comes from eating pizza is minimized or avoided all together. On this note I can report that my tinkering in this area has yielded promising results. My stated macro-nutrient goal is to have 40% of the calories come from carbohydrates, 30% each from protein and fats. The 40-30-30 ratio seems to allow one to eat 3 -5 slices of pie and be fresh as a daisy. More to come on this pivotal point.
