Author Topic: Steel Plate Attempt (Read 7179 times)

parallei · « **on:** November 27, 2011, 10:38:26 PM »

Got hold of a 14.5" x 14.5" x 1/2" A36 plate. The fabricator that I bought it from here in Denver told me that someone had bought a number of the same thing for pizza stones as gifts for friends for Xmas!

Anyway, preheat for 75 min at 525, turn on broiler and launch. Plate about 4" below broiler in older Viking electric oven.

Just about 4 min. Need to cut back on the broiler action I guess. Tasty, though not very handsome pies......

Jackie Tran · « **Reply #1 on:** November 27, 2011, 10:40:30 PM »

That slice looks great Paul! The cheese, sauce, and sausage looks melded together perfectly.

Chau

Jet_deck · « **Reply #2 on:** November 28, 2011, 12:32:39 AM »

I would totally hit it. Looks great from here!

scott123 · « **Reply #3 on:** November 28, 2011, 07:04:15 AM »

Paul, congratulations- both on the new steel acquisition and on the, imo, very handsome looking pies. How about an upskirt next time?

parallei · « **Reply #4 on:** November 28, 2011, 10:22:56 AM »

Chau, JD and Scott- Thanks for the kind words.

Scott - the bottom could have been a bit darker for my tastes. Will photograph next attempt.

chickenparm · « **Reply #5 on:** November 29, 2011, 11:40:40 PM »

Did not see this topic until just a minute ago.Very Nice work! Looking forward to more pizzas!

Hdale85 · « **Reply #6 on:** November 30, 2011, 01:25:27 AM »

Yeah I gotta go get a piece of steel..... going to order deep dish pans though as I'm making deep dish pizza's for our Christmas eve dinner tradition. I'd make regular pizza but I think it'd be hard to turn out 6-10 pizza's on a steel plate in any decent amount of time.

scott123 · « **Reply #7 on:** November 30, 2011, 08:43:12 AM »

It would definitely take some trial and error to figure out how much heat/time it takes to replenish the plate between that many pizzas, but, after you figure that out, you could do 6 NY style pies in the time it takes to make 1 deep dish.

If this Christmas Eve dinner is the kind of meal where all the food has to be ready at a given time, then, yes, go with deep dish, but if you've got, say, an hour window where you can be giving your guests a 16" pizza every 8 minutes, then I think that's very doable. Your stretching skills would have to be finely honed, though.

Hdale85 · « **Reply #8 on:** November 30, 2011, 12:00:02 PM »

Yeah, and so far I have yet to make a NY style pizza so I think I'll stick with the deep dish as my first one turned out very well.

parallei · « **Reply #9 on:** December 18, 2011, 09:40:45 PM »

Another try with the 1/2" steel plate. The steel was about 565 when the pies hit it. I added 1.5% sugar this time, blech! Though it helps browning, my tastes have changed, and I now can't handle sugar in a pizza dough. I can taste it. Honey maybe.........

Sausage Pie about 4 min with top broiler on for 3 min.

Patata Pie, 5 min with broiler on for 4 min. 5 min is too long with the sugar in the dough.

Obligatory skirt shot for Scott123, though I'm still waiting to see what his soapstone pies look like!

Jackie Tran · « **Reply #10 on:** December 18, 2011, 09:59:53 PM »

Nice job Paul, forgot to ask last time what type of sausage you use and if you put them on raw or par cooked.

Chau

parallei · « **Reply #11 on:** December 18, 2011, 10:24:01 PM »

Thanks Chau.....

The sausage is from a small local shop that makes it fresh every day. I think they sell most of it to restaurants. I turned Chris (WestCountry) on to the place, and he has become fan also. They make a mild and hot (bulk or in natural casings). I only use the mild. Unlike many Italian sausage makers, they don't use any (or very little) paprika for color. The pork actually stands forward. I buy 3 or 4 lbs at a time, vacuum pack into smaller denominations and freeze it. It freezes well.
The shop is:

Belfiore Genuine Italian Sausage
5820 W 38th Ave
Wheat Ridge, CO 80212
(303) 455-4653

PM me if you'd like me to freeze and overnight some to you. I'd be happy to do it. Now would be the time of year!

Paul

Oh yeah, I par cook it......

norma427 · « **Reply #12 on:** December 18, 2011, 11:26:03 PM »

Paul,

Great looking pie!

Looks like you really have nice crumb structure.

Norma

breadman_nz · « **Reply #13 on:** December 20, 2011, 05:32:10 AM »

I'll add my 2 cents worth to this thread.

I just picked up a 1.2mm x 400mm x 400mm (that's 1/2" x 16 x 16 for you imperial types) chunk of steel from a local engineering shop today.

Used it to bake pizzas for the first time tonight. I use a simple dough - strong white flour, 58% hydration, 2.6% salt, 0.7% yeast with overnight cold ferment.

Oven heated to 550-560 degrees (Fahrenheit) for one hour. It's a fan forced electric oven, with a single element only located on the rear wall (behind a shield where the fan is). I don't have an infrared thermometer, so couldn't measure the steel plate temperature.

I did three pies, all turned out similarly. I'll get some pictures online soon, but in essence, they look pretty similar to those posted above - and a definite improvement over my thin ceramic stone. Crispier crust on the outer (with a bit less oven spring - although I think I only used 0.5% yeast today), and a crispier base crust - not soggy like previously. My bake times were around 5 minutes.

Overall pretty happy, and will definitely continue to work with it. That steel is one heavy mutha!

scott123 · « **Reply #14 on:** December 20, 2011, 08:20:25 PM »

Paul, those are exceptionally nice looking pies. Are you sure you could really taste the 1.5% sugar? Sometimes I go with 1% sugar and sometimes not, and I can't really taste the difference. How long are you fermenting for? If you ferment for a long time (more than 3 days), the dough can get pretty sweet tasting.

Breadman, that's great to hear that the steel is working out well for you. I'm not familiar with vertically mounted electrical elements. Does this translate into the need for lots of turns for the pizza? Photos would obviously help, especially of the dough- getting the right flour can be an obstacle for some international members.

Btw, even though this is a steel plate centric thread and you're now working with steel plate, don't be afraid to start your own thread. Once your own thread, each time you make pizza, you can update it, and it becomes a record of your journey.

parallei · « **Reply #15 on:** December 20, 2011, 10:27:24 PM »

Thanks for the kind words Scott.

Yeah, I can taste the sweetness in the dough. I tasted another piece the next morning. Strange. I'm pretty sure I didn't mess up the measurements, but I guess it is possible. It was a 22 hour dough. The first time I've used the mixer in awhile. Straight dough, mix with paddle 'till it came together (min or so), rest 15 min, dough hook for 5 min, bulk into the fridge for 14 hrs, split dough up and ball, back to fridge 6 hrs, balls at room temp. for 2 hrs. It was 100% KASL, 63% HR, 1.5% Sugar, 2% Oil (canola), 2% Salt., 0.5% IDY.

breadman_nz · « **Reply #16 on:** December 21, 2011, 05:03:44 AM »

Quote from: scott123 on December 20, 2011, 08:20:25 PM

Breadman, that's great to hear that the steel is working out well for you. I'm not familiar with vertically mounted electrical elements. Does this translate into the need for lots of turns for the pizza? Photos would obviously help, especially of the dough- getting the right flour can be an obstacle for some international members.

Btw, even though this is a steel plate centric thread and you're now working with steel plate, don't be afraid to start your own thread. Once your own thread, each time you make pizza, you can update it, and it becomes a record of your journey.

Will do... but to be brief (and then get out of the way of the OP!):

1) Some pies do seem to need a turn to be fully evened out. The fan forced bake does a reasonable job of evening out the oven temps from front (the door) to back (where the heating element is).

2) I use Champion 'Beta Strong' flour, which is readily obtainable from wholesale food warehouses here. Here's the guff: http://www.championflour.com/products/flour/bakers-flour/85/champion-beta-(strong)-flour.aspx
It does well for all my pizza, pasta and bread-making kneads.

scott123 · « **Reply #17 on:** December 21, 2011, 09:35:46 AM »

Paul, that was KASL? That's not bad for KASL

Was it tough at all or do you prefer it on the chewy side?

Breadman, I don't think, for your purposes, that that particular flour is ideal, but, after you start the new thread, I'll go into it further.

fazzari · « **Reply #18 on:** December 22, 2011, 11:18:23 PM »

Quote from: parallei on December 20, 2011, 10:27:24 PM

Thanks for the kind words Scott.

Yeah, I can taste the sweetness in the dough. I tasted another piece the next morning. Strange. I'm pretty sure I didn't mess up the measurements, but I guess it is possible. It was a 22 hour dough. The first time I've used the mixer in awhile. Straight dough, mix with paddle 'till it came together (min or so), rest 15 min, dough hook for 5 min, bulk into the fridge for 14 hrs, split dough up and ball, back to fridge 6 hrs, balls at room temp. for 2 hrs. It was 100% KASL, 63% HR, 1.5% Sugar, 2% Oil (canola), 2% Salt., 0.5% IDY.

Paul,
Excellent looking pizza....a favor please!! Can you describe the texture, the bottom crust, the outside edge, anything you can think of.....I've gotta know!!

John

parallei · « **Reply #19 on:** December 22, 2011, 11:47:16 PM »

Well I'll try John.......I typically don't do 100% HG pies anymore.

As I noted above, 5 min was a bit long for one of the pies. They were both a bit crisp for my tastes. Initially, the crumb on the inside was tender, but it seemed to toughen up quickely. As you can see, the crumb structure was fairly open. The shorter bake time was better. If I where to do this again with 100% HG flour, I'd probably bump the hydration a bit more. Plus, I'm still trying to figure out the steel plate thing.

The only doughs I'd felt the need to re-balled in the past were usually 70% HR and above. I'm going to try the re-ball thing with a 50/50 KASL/00, with a moderate HR (say 63% or so) dough soon on the steel plate. I'll let you know how it goes.