Baked the pies off last night...One for the gf, one for me, and then an appetizer. I preheated the oven at 550 with the stone on the highest shelf for 50 minutes slipped on the frozen towel then kicked over the broiler on high for 10. I stretched out the mini app pizza and immediately was shocked. The dough handled beautifully. It was extensible and slack, but had good gluten development despite the minimal mechanical kneading I did. I spread some olive oil thin, sprinkled it with sea salt, basil, and oregano and launched it into the oven. To my surprise the bottom didnt overly burn(the first pizza usually burns...) and it turned out great..."Tonight is going to be a good bake!"
I let the broiler run for 5 minutes as I prepared for the next pie my girlfriends...I stretched the skin and topped the pie, threw it in the oven a watched attentively to assure it would not burn, to no avail it turned out slightly more charred than her liking and I think two things caused this: Excess flour and poor stretching, her pizzas rim was slightly thicker than it should be which yielded more weight and more char as well as a slight doughyness. My pie was next so I took everything I learned and tried applying it, paid close attention to stretching and the amount of bench flour, but my problems also occured in the oven. When cooking these pies using the broiler method you need to turn, lift, and juggle the pies throughout the process in order to assure even cooking, well this is easier said than done with a wooden peel, because of this the pie ended up cooking a bit too much on one side, but overall it was good(I think im actually a char-oholic). One thing that did puzzle me was these very small blistering bumps one my pizza...It was essentially a marinara with maybe a tbsp of mozz sprinkled over it...was it the shredded cheese that burned or the dough blisters? I made close attention the the patting and flattening of it, oh well, it was delicious and very good, not the best, but good.
I really like the way the dough felt slightly more hydrated(70%) than normal doughs which hover at 65/66 and didnt have an extreme sourness just a slight tang...my doughs sourness levels are not really consistent, sometimes their really sour which I like and sometimes there mild, and usually when their really sour the dough is harder to stretch...is this from the acids?
any way here are some pics didnt really get any good shots because the camera was acting goofy. comments more than welcomed!
