Under the pizza base

[IcePizza]

Hi,

When stretching out the pizza dough with the dough on a flat surface, is it best to stretch it on plain flour, semolina or corn meal?

I went to a pizza outlet a few days back and it looks as though they stretched it on flour.  This made the pizza smell real bad to a point where I could not eat it.  There was dry uncooked flour underneath the pizza base.

Am I wrong?

Any help would be great.

Thanks in advance.

[norma427]

IcePizza,

Plain flour is fine for using as bench flour.  The trick is not to get too much bench flour on the dough ball before opening it.  If there is too much bench flour left on the skin, there can be dry uncooked flour underneath the baked pizza.  Usually I drop my dough ball in a container with flour, then also put a little flour on the bench before opening the dough ball. 

You can also use corn meal or semolina.  Either can also burn if too much is left on the bottom pizza skin.

If you are using higher hydration doughs, it can become tricky what to do.

Norma

[Giggliato]

I have come to enjoy the taste of a bit of charred semolina on the underside of my pizzas.