problems

[skan]

Hello

I've just tried to make a pizza and I had several problems:

The dough was impossible to stretch, it kept shrinking back. It was too elastic.
I baked it in a home oven at 260ºC and the resulting crust was too hard.

How could I solve these problems?

I used high protein flower, 60% water, 3% fresh yeast, one spoon of olive oil and salt, and I kept the dough on the fridge for 24h.

[buceriasdon]

More details would be helpful to diagnosing the problem. You may want to up the water ratio perhaps to 62% or use a blend of a lower protein flour. How do you knead the dough and for what length of time? By the sound of it you are over developing the gluten in the dough making it difficult to stretch. Have you tried to let the skin rest for a bit of time then restretch? Generally for a 24 hour ferment it's better to underknead the dough and allow time to develop the gluten structure. How much salt and oil exactly are you using? One teaspoon or one tablespoon? Big difference. Once again for your baking regimen, more details would be helpful. Do you use a pizza stone, if so where in the the oven do you have it? How long is the bake time? High gluten flour baked for too much time can yield a tough dry crust. thanks
Don

Hello

I've just tried to make a pizza and I had several problems:

The dough was impossible to stretch, it kept shrinking back. It was too elastic.
I baked it in a home oven at 260ºC and the resulting crust was too hard.

How could I solve these problems?

I used high protein flower, 60% water, 3% fresh yeast, one spoon of olive oil and salt, and I kept the dough on the fridge for 24h.

[skan]

Hi

I didn't want to give you a too long explanation.
I'm at my girlfriend's house and she doesn't have any scale.  But more or less I tried to follow the Napolitan recipe.  with 3 cups of flour, almost 1 cup of mineral water, half tablespoon of salt, 2 tablespoons of oil and 10g of fresh baker's yeast .

I mixed most of the flour with the water and let it rest for 20 min.
In a glass I dissolved the yeast in few water (and 1 teaspoon of sugar).
Then I mixed the flour, water and yeast and knead it by hand for 10min,
I let it rest for 20min
I added to this dough the oil and salt and mixed again for 15 min.
I've added a llittle bit more water because it didn't look as wet as the the pictures I've seen.
Then I leave it in the fridge for 24h covered with plastic film.
It grew maybe 2-3 times.
Again it looked dryer than other's picture but didn't add more water
I kept it out of the fridge for half an hour.
I just tried to stretch it on the table but was almost impossible. It kept shrinking back or breaking.

I halved the dough and put one part on the oven, getting a not very thin layer. Even though the final result was not too bad, though a little bit hard.
With the other half... I added more water, getting a much more viscous dough and I baked it, getting a very hard result.
Maybe i touched (stretched) too much the dough trying to stretch it.

I couldn't try a high Tª on the oven because I still don't have a stone and this oven is very bad (it's supposed to be 250ºC).
My flour is 13% protein. Maybe crispy doesn't mean the same for me than for others. Or maybe a crispy pizza is good if you get to make a thin crust and I couldn't.
I think my kneading is hard enough. I see hoy my mother or girlfriend knead and it's much softer.

[buceriasdon]

Thank you for more details. A couple of things, you kneaded the dough way too long for a 24 ferment, close to 25 minutes is not needed or beneficial. Four to five minutes kneading would be better. Tripling in size while in the fridge in 24 hours is too much. I wouldn't increase the salt but would cut back on yeast. This however could be created by over kneading. Some activity in the fridge is fine but three times is not. You want the dough to rise after removal from the fridge and allowed to come to room temperature for two hours. Trying to work cold dough can lead to your problems of spring back. One half an hour is not enough time. It is best not to re knead dough just before opening the doughball, it needs time for the gluten to relax. Hope this helps but you do need to change some of your methods.
Don

[skan]

Hi

Maybe it didn't triple the volume but just doubled it.
The kneading was made by hand, maybe with 5min stop in between. I've thought it was needed to knead it for 20min.
I didn't reknead it after removal from the fridge, though I had to spread it and stretch it a lot.

Then, next time I'll try allowing it kneading for a shorter time and trying not to rise its temperature. And after removal from the fridge I'll leave it 2 hours at room temp.
I'll also try with lower gluten flour.