Omid,
I wanted to ask,do you sometimes get bubbles in your doughs while they rise,or is that a thing from the past for you?I don't make Neapolitan style pies just yet,however, once in a while,I get a dough that grows a large bubble.I thought I had the the technique down but once in a while,they show up in a dough ball,when some others do not have that problem,but were made the same time or same mix.
Dear Bill, if I understand you correctly, you would like to know why sometimes bubble formations of unusual magnitude occur in your dough balls during fermentation/levitation. While I do not know how you produce your dough and how you, thereafter, craft and treat your dough balls, I am going to, first, speculate that perhaps you are not making your dough balls properly. So, my advice to you would be to pay close attention to
how you fashion your dough balls. Make sure they are divested of air bubbles within as much as possible. Such air bubbles can act as depositories for the carbon dioxide that is produced by fermentation. Under average circumstances, I think a dough ball, right after it is shaped, can benefit from having the following characteristics:
1. Round like a ball;
2. Moderately tight, but not rigid and inflexible, with even distribution of dough inside the ball and with no sizable air bubbles trapped inside;
3. No cracks as much as possible;
4. Evenly smooth dough skin all around the ball; and
5. Properly healed umbilical chord.
Second, I am going to hypothesize that perhaps your dough balls are near a source of heat, which can hyper-activate production of carbonic gases within your dough balls.
At last, but not least, I surmise that the dough might be suffering of uneven formation of gluten network, which might be attributed to uneven kneading, uneven mixing of dry flour with pre-hydrated or autolyzed flour, uneven mixing of two different types of flours, or etc.
Good night!
(You are the second gentleman from Kentucky that I have met here. Lucky you!—there are no
muttons and
burgoos in California.)
