Pizza More Than 60 Recipes - Tony Gemignani

[giotto]

Pizza more than 60 recipes is a book where the most renowned people in the pizza industry make their pizza knowledge available, thanks to Tony Gemignani's presence and management of the US World Pizza Champion team.  Peter Reinhart's review pretty well sums up my feelings as well, suggesting that Tony Gemignani's passion for pizza will spur American pizza renaissance to greater heights.  Finally, top chefs at places like Lou Malnati and Edwardo's were actually consulted and acted as reviewers for the Chicago style pizza recipes.  Roberto Caporuscio is the only graduate from the Associazione Verace Pizza Napoletano in the United States authorized to certify Neapolitan style pizza, and he shares ratios and technique in this book.  You'll also find top New York pizzerias covered, including Totonno's white pizza, Lombardi's pizza, Ray's on Prince Street, Grimaldi's, and even New York Meatball pizza that many enjoy at late nights.  The authors even took water from places like Chicago to dispel the old water myths.  California, grilled and others are also covered.  I noticed that simple rolling is used to help the masses in some cases.  However, appropriate stretching techniques are provided for Neapolitan and other styles, and all recipes are created by hand, with appropriate machine time differences.  Of course, you are not going to find a better authority on pizza tossing, where one hand rather than two is illustrated so you can expand your horizons.  I liked Dave Ostrander's (the pizza doctor's) comment as well... this book is written by a real-world, in the trenches, pizza man.  Tony's pizzeria produces about 10 - 14 batches of 32 lbs of flour a day.  Figuring that 50 lbs produces near 70 large pizzas, we are talking over 400 pizzas a day.  While this is not a book about chemistry, it is a book with excellent photographs that show how to produce many pizza styles at home with much talent wrapped around it. I ordered it via Amazon.

[Steve]

Looks like one for my library! I just ordered my copy and put the book in the Pizza Books section on the main page. 

[mmarston]

I also recommend this book very highly. I'm a newcomer to making Pizza and to the forum but I made a very fine Neopolitan pie on my first try with the recipe from "Pizza more than 60 recipes" My only complaint is that the recipes are by volume only and not weight.

[Pete-zza]

I have just started to read the book Pizza More Than 60 Recipes and it appears at first blush to be a well written one. However, I share Mike's (mmarston) view on the desirability of having baker's percents. I think baker's percents give a recipe or formulation a great deal more flexibility.

It is possible to do some calculations with recipes to get certain baker's percents, particularly when certain dough weights and pizza sizes are specified. But it can still take a lot of work to get those baker's percents. For example, I deconstructed the NY style dough recipe from the book and got a  baker's percent for water than was quite a bit higher than what is normally used. To show how I did this, I determined the weights of the ingredients in the recipe except for the flour. This is what I ended up with:

1 package active dry yeast, 0.25 oz.
1 c. lukewarm water and 1 1/4 c. ice cold water, 18.74 oz. total
1 t. sugar, 0.14 oz.
1 T. salt, 0.59 oz.
2 T. olive oil, 0.99 oz.

Adding the above weight values together and subtracting the sum (20.71 oz.) from 45 oz. (the total dough weight specified for the recipe) yields a weight for the flour of 24.29 oz. For that amount of flour, 18.74 oz. of water yields a baker's percent of a bit over 77%. I first used a mathematically accurate conversion factor of 1 c. water = 8.33 oz. to get the 18.74 oz. value. Then, as an alternative approach, I measured out 2 1/4 c. of water by eye and weighed it and got around 18.25 oz. This value yields a hydration value of a bit over 75%. Either way, the hydration is higher than what I am used to using for a NY style (e.g., Lehmann) dough. Maybe part of the wetness is taken up by the dustiing flour, but there is no way to know how much that comes to. Also, the instructions for the recipe indicate that the dough will be on the wet side. So, maybe it is normal.

I also calculated that the thickness factor for the dough is 0.1326, based on a 15-ounce dough ball weight for a 12-inch pizza. That thickness factor is more in line with a thick crust than a thin, NY style crust, which typically has a thickness factor of about 0.08-0.10.

So, as can be seen, there is a limit to what can be determined by examining a recipe where the ingredients are specified in volumes rather than weights. The best way, and sometimes the only way, to know what you will get from a recipe is to actually try the recipe out and see what happens. When I do this, I usually note the weights of flour and water that appear to produce a workable dough. That way, next time I make the dough I have a pretty good idea of how much water and flour to use.

Peter

[giotto]

Personally, I have learned from experience the value to see recipes as important guidelines.  There's just too many variances in flour, ovens and other equipment, not to mention experience and the little things people do on their own as noted by many threads of many people in the past. 

Naturally, % helps identify a baseline between the author and you.  But I'm looking for direction in a recipe, and I look for what a recipe can tell me based on its basic implications and how I expect that to impact my final result.  I had used 70% water before for rustic  breads, and I achieved the moistness I was looking to achieve.  In the case of pizza doughs, I suspected that increased hydrations would impact chewiness with certain kneading.  So I increased my water hydrations 5% at a time to see what works with the flours that I have available. 

I'm learning that reviews need to be like biographies, the best ones don't share what they like; but what they achieve, and explanations as to what was most likely to cause it.  Because scrapers can get old real quick, convenience vs. the amount of benefit noted from hydrations need to be taken into account.  Tony Gemignani's New York pizza dough and other recipes have validated much in the way of direction. 

[Pete-zza]

I generally can best and most quickly sense that a dough recipe is going to take me in a new direction by seeing the baker's percents. In most cases, the reason I convert an interesting recipe to baker’s percents in the first place is to be able to scale the recipe to any size I want, for example, to make a 16-inch pizza to compare with other 16-inch pizzas I have made in the same style. But, sometimes the effect of calculating baker’s percents tells me a lot more. For example, when I know that the optimum absorption rate of a given flour is around 60% and a recipe I have analyzed calls for something considerably higher, I know that I am going to be challenged to make a dough based on such a recipe and that I may have to take certain steps to avoid failure. Likewise if some other ingredient is outside of the normal range I associate with the ingredient. In due course, I expect that I will use the baker’s percents I calculated for the Morgan-Gemignani NY style dough to scale the recipe to make dough for a 16-inch pizza to compare with the others I have made in the same style. I look forward to the results of that exercise because I know I am going to learn something of value from it.

Peter

[giotto]

Pete-zza:

Makes sense. I'm trying a Biga right now with a final hydration mixture that heads in the direction of the New York recipe.  It was a bit sticky at first.  But the dough became surprisingly manageable.  Pendleton can produce a bready result, so I reduced the oil down by 25% of the recipe.  Looking forward to it as well.

[giotto]

Here's an earlier experience that I wanted to refer to that had the beginnings of a starter (it was more of a biga), and high hydration levels comparable to what Tony recommends in his book, with pictures and description... It was very good and I hope to reproduce with some minor modifications (page 7 of Quality NY Techniques): http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,524.msg17392.html#msg17392

[Perk]

I just got this book today, it was back ordered, This evening I saw it on my porch so I don't know if it came Friday or today Saturday. Must have been yesterday. I go through my garage when I get home. LOL! 
It is a very good book for  recipes.
I would really like side views of the pizza to show the inners of the crust.
But none the less I think this book will be of great value when it comes to Chicago pizza I have no clue about.

Anyways this book I would recommend, It even tells you where to place your stone in your oven for each pizza because each pizza is different

[DreamingTomato]

I also recommend this book very highly. I'm a newcomer to making Pizza and to the forum but I made a very fine Neopolitan pie on my first try with the recipe from "Pizza more than 60 recipes" My only complaint is that the recipes are by volume only and not weight.

Hi there, I am a newbie too in pizza making and I got this book too from my bookstore.

I tried making the dough from the recipe too but the dough is too watery? 7 and 1 Quart Cups flour -> 2 Cups water.

Does anyone faced the same problem as me?

[Pete-zza]

DreamingTomato,

I also have the Morgan-Gemignani book and I have also tried the Neapolitan pizza dough recipe you mentioned. When I previously analyzed the recipe, I concluded that the hydration (the weight of water divided by the weight of flour) was around 50%, give or take a few percent. Today, I used a different approach and worked backwards from the total dough weight to determine more accurately the weight of flour. Based on that calculated weight, and using the standard conversion of two cups of water to a weight, I calculated a hydration of around 54-55%. That is considered to be on the low side, although it is only a couple percent or so lower than the rated absorption value for the Caputo 00 flour. Even then, when I described my results using the recipe, at Reply 2 at http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,2088.msg18385.html#msg18385, I expressed concern about the low hydration. I believe I could have improved upon the results I got, as I noted in the above post, but I felt that the hydration of the dough as described in the book was far too low, even for a standard home oven. It's a puzzle to me that you found the dough too wet. About the only possible explanation I can come up with is that there was a mismeasurement somewhere, of either the water or the flour. Snce both are given in volume measurements in the recipe, it is easy to see how you might not have gotten the right combination using volume measurements.

Peter

[DreamingTomato]

Thank you Peter for the detailed repy.

If there is a way of justifying the watery dough(Its batter-like), it would be the fact I didnt use 00 flour. I cant get it in Singapore and the only way i simulate it was to use 3 cups all purpose flour+1 cup cake flour.

Errr, and I did sift the flour. *Wonders if thats a contributing factor*

My thoughts are it cant be due to the nature of the simulated flour because I went to check out similar recipes on this forum and the ratio of flour to water is similar to the recipe given

[Pete-zza]

DreamingTomato,

I think that your problem was flour related. I believe that the Caputo 00 flour is milled to a finer, more powdery consistency than a basic all-purpose flour or cake flour and perhaps it better absorbs the water as a result. In fact, there are some members who are able to use over 65% hydration with the Caputo 00 flour. Unless you measured out your flour blend after sifting it, I don't think that that should have produced a wet, batter-like dough. I think you should have been able to use around 54-55% hydration with a blend of all-purpose flour and cake flour. What you might try next time is to start with the water, add the salt to dissolve, then the cake yeast, and gradually stir in your flour blend just until you get a smooth and supple dough ball.

Peter

[DreamingTomato]

Peter,

Thanks again for the input, I will try this method tonight! 

[tcarlisle]

Hi there, I am a newbie too in pizza making and I got this book too from my bookstore.

I tried making the dough from the recipe too but the dough is too watery? 7 and 1 Quart Cups flour -> 2 Cups water.

Does anyone faced the same problem as me?

I haven't done this particular recipe, but the first (and only) I did was the NY style dough recipe. I got similar results. Going by the quantities in that recipe it ends up being the consistency of pancake batter. I could see that clearly wasn't going to work and added more flour until it was right --about another cup. I recently tried it again thinking maybe I made an error or something. Same thing.When I convert that recipe to baker's percents it turns out to be hydration in the upper 70's. Adding another cup of flour puts hydration right at about 64%. The flour used was KABF. And no, the way it was measured, whether it was sifted, etc wouldn't throw it off that far. This has to be a misprint.

The recipe calls for 5.25 to 5.5 cups bread flour to 2.25 cups water. I am quite certain they meant to print 6.25 to 6.5 c bread flour, because using that yields the right hydration and also 3lb total dough. The recipe says it is for three pizza's, so 3lb sounds right. Making the recipes with 6.5 c does give a very nice result.

Since that was the first recipe I tried, I take the book with a grain of salt and really haven't done much else with it. Recipes found here are just fine. The book does give some nice ideas for topping combination and variety.

[marian33]

My favorite type of pizza is my mother's homemade pizza's bacon, cheese, and hamburger. That was her specialty when it comes to pizza. So I think I need to get a copy of this book "Pizza More Than 60 Recipes" so that she can cook me not just one pizza but more than 60 pizza. Thank you for sharing this book review to me!