Dough sticking to peel

[carter]

I made the olive oil dough in the artisan bread book.  It came out good but it was very sticky.  When I shaped the pizza I used a good deal of bench flour (KA brand bread flour)  I also put corn meal on my peel but it just wouldn't slide like the normal Lemann's style dough I had been making.  Would using a different type of flour for the benching or on the peel help?

[scott123]

1. This dough, at 78% hydration, contains an excessive amount of water.

2. Recipes that measure the flour and water by volume are usually formulated for amateurs, and thus are generally not worth making.

[buceriasdon]

High hydration doughs can be a challenge, but they can also yield very good results. Probably the easiest solution is lightly oiled parchment paper, though getting the skin onto the paper is it's own challenge. It can then be stretched out more and then topped and the excess paper trimmed away with scissors, the paper and pizza pulled onto the peel and then loaded. You might have watched videos of the skin being topped then pulled onto a floured wood peel and quickly loaded in the oven. This will work for very lightly topped pizza. I use a blend of regular flour and rice flour or use semolina flour to dust the peel. I got into the habit of periodically shaking the peel to loosen and make sure the pizza still moves while topping. I put sauce on then shake, I put cheese on, shake and so forth. I also keep a long length of dental floss close at at hand and if need be I pull the thread underneath the skin from one end to the other to free it up. Others suggest lifting the skin and blowing under the skin. For now perhaps using a bit more bench flour may be required until you get more use to working wetter doughs. Don't concern yourself with round as with any new endeavor practice is required. Good luck. Keep at it, it will come to you.
Don

I made the olive oil dough in the artisan bread book.  It came out good but it was very sticky.  When I shaped the pizza I used a good deal of bench flour (KA brand bread flour)  I also put corn meal on my peel but it just wouldn't slide like the normal Lemann's style dough I had been making.  Would using a different type of flour for the benching or on the peel help?

[TXCraig1]

Others suggest lifting the skin and blowing under the skin. For now perhaps using a bit more bench flour may be required until you get more use to working wetter doughs. Don't concern yourself with round as with any new endeavor practice is required. Good luck. Keep at it, it will come to you.

Be careful if you try the blowing method. It works well, but if you're too agressive (as I have been once or twice) you can levitate the whole pie and literally fly it right off the peel.

I agree with using some extra bench flour, cutting back a little each time, until you are comfortable and find your sweet spot. A little extra flour can fill in for some experience and vice versa. A little burned flour is better than a blob of dough and toppings.

CL

[moose13]

I too do the peel shake after each step.
Sauce-shake, cheese-shake, toppings-shake. Then a major shake right before launching in the oven.
I learned this after too many football shaped pizzas.

[carter]

Thanks for all the helpful advice.

[jeffereynelson]

One other thing to note would be that your dough could use some additional kneading. Very high hydration doughs are much easier to work with and come together better from lots of kneading. I have a recipe for bread I use that has a ~95% hydration. you have to mix the crap out of it in the KA just to be able to pick it up.

Also when you shake it on the peel, make sure the ENTIRE pizza is moving. I've thought the pizza was free only to realize a tiny portion was sticking to the peel and ruined my launch onto the stone before.

Jeff

[JDK77573]

This topic kinda applies to my question, but I could use some clarification.

I'm probably the noobest of the newbies around here. I just bought a stone for the first time. Until now I've been using a pan.

My impression is that my dough is just too gooey for my uncooked pie to move as a unit. I had a near-disaster trying to get my first try off of the peel today.

Does this just mean I'm using too "amateur" of a dough recipe? Or that I need to lay down a lot more corn meal or flour onto the peel first? Or is there some other obvious macro concept that I'm missing here?   

[Bill/SFNM]

JDK,

You might find it interesting that over 7 years ago I found this forum while trying to solve the same problem - sticky dough.    There are a number of causes and solutions, but IMO more bench flour or different types of bench flour are not the best approach. Assuming your hydration level is appropriate for the kind of crust you are trying to make, stickiness often indicates that not enough water has been absorbed by the flour. Water is absorbed by the flour during mixing and kneading and fermenting and proofing. You should be looking at what you are doing during these stages to ensure proper absorption.

   

[La Sera]

I own a pizza business and we don't build the pizza on the peel. The time on the peel is as short as we can make it - timed in seconds. A simple Margherita is slid onto the peel off the table onto the peel and into the oven in about 5 seconds. You don't need a lot of bench flour, you need a delicate touch and some practice handling the dough. Light toppings-type Margheritas are simply lifted and pulled onto the clean, and lightly floured peel. Make sure to leave a small amount of dough overhanging the peel edge so it sticks to the oven floor, then pull the peel back horizontally with a little shake. Many beginners want to lift the peel as they retract it. I don't understand why they do that. It comes off easier if you pull back the peel near horizontal.

Heavy toppings are different. Here's my way: we form the dough on a table (stainless with a pinch of flour), then lay it on a floured round cutting board like this: Link>>.

We build the toppings, and slide it onto the peel. With heavy toppings, we may use a long stainless spatula to lift the leading edge of the dough as we slide it onto the peel. Once again, it's only on the peel for seconds.

That's just my way. Others may do it differently. When you have a line of tickets a mile long on a Saturday night, you're forced to come up with some repeatable way to get it done without ever having a mistake in or out of an oven. We can't afford mistakes.

[JDK77573]

Bill, thanks for the tips. At some point soon I'll be paying more attention to dough preparation, and I'll be considering all the things you mentioned. I'm focusing on one skill at a time...right now it's using the stone and peel. Dough improvement may be next.

La Sera, I just tried your suggestions for working with the peel and stone, and they worked! Thanks so much!

I didn't feel confident trying it without opening the oven completely and pulling the rack all the way out. I was a bit concerned about how much heat was lost in that process. The oven was open for probably a good 20 seconds, though I wasn't timing it.

The pie ended up overdone. I left it in so long because I thought the bottom wasn't done enough, though I may have been fooled by the coloration caused by the bench flour. Back when I used a pan, one of my main complaints was that the bottom would be underdone and the top overdone. I thought a stone would fix that. Not sure if it did. I may not have let it heat up long enough. I'll try longer next time and see if that helps.