Additional Info Duplicating Pizza Crust Akron , OH

[SteveH]

Dear Pizza Making Members:

I grew up in Akron, Ohio which is popular for their medium thick crusted style Pizza. The crust has a slightly crunchy exterior with a soft interior crust that sort of melts in your mouth. Does not really have a bread texture but is a little more biscuit like. Approx 20 years ago I moved to North Carolina and have been experimenting ever since trying to duplicate the crust which is still popular in Akron Ohio.

My current recipe is as follows:
5 ½ cups bread flour
2 cups water
2 packages active dry yeast
4 table spoons extra virgin olive oil
1/8 cup Mazola corn oil
2 table spoons sugar
1 teaspoon salt

I mix the ingredients in a kitchen aid mixer. I then allow the dough to rise for approx one hr. Then I divide the dough into three balls and form each into bottom of three 10-12 inch pizza pans generously coated with either Crisco or lard. I cover the pans and let sit for several hrs before adding the toppings and baking in an electric convection oven for 10-12 minutes at 500 degrees.

For the most part the pizza turns out very good but I have not yet duplicated the pizza crust I grew up within in Akron. Maybe I will die trying but I do not plan on giving up until I am satisfied.

Can you provide any suggestions? I read in a Pizza making book that Caputo flour may help with the texture of the crust but I have not yet tried Caputo Flour. Do you think it could help with the above recipe or should I try something all together different? Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you.   

[buzz]

It would help if you could describe the texture of the crust you're after. Authentic Chicago deep dish or medium crust (a la Connie's, for example) is rich with oil and biscuit-like, which means that the kneading time is very short--the more you knead, the more bread-like the crust becomes. if you let the bread sit in the pan, it will turn out more bread-like.

Your recipe has very little oil for the amount of flour (personally I find extra-virgin olive oil to be too strong for pizza--you might want to try light olive oil)--and I would use canola instead of corn oil, which has less taste to it (unless you like the taste of corn oil!). A good rule is 6 TBS (not tsp!) oil per 2 cups flour.

1 tsp salt is a bit light for this recipe--you might want to double that.

I would personally cut the sugar in half.

You might try cutting back on the yeast a little--I would probably use 3 tsp. (a package and-a-half) for this much flour.

Also, I would not use bread flour--it contains too much gluten for this type of pizza. use all-purpose, or Ceresota/Hecker's.

It's probably best to experiment with smaller batches (cut the recipe in half or by a third) to see what you come up with!

Have fun!

[Pete-zza]

SteveH,

Unless you know that the Akron style pizza dough you are trying to duplicate uses the Caputo 00 flour, or one similar to it, I don't think that the Caputo flour is the answer. The Caputo 00 flour is entirely different from the bread flour you are now using and most other domestic flours.

In trying to replicate, or "reverse engineer", a particular dough, much information about the dough is required. This includes the style of the dough (e.g., NY, thin or thick crust, etc.), type of flour used, typical pizza sizes/shapes, and the finished crust characteristics (e.g., soft, light, open and airy, tender, crispy, chewy, color, etc.). It also helps to know whether the dough is made and used the same day or if it is subjected to refrigeration. It also sometimes helps to know how the pizzas are baked, that is, using a hearth-type (deck) oven, a conveyor oven, using screens/disks, pans, etc. The more you know about the pizza, the more likely you are to be able to come up with something that is like it.

It will be quite easy to calculate the baker's percents for your recipe, at least in a rough way, to determine whether it fits the characteristics of the Akron-style dough/crust you have in mind. However, more information about that style will be needed before being able to do this. Even then, it is not easy to reverse engineer the targeted dough. If you read the several reverse engineering threads on this forum, including the DiFara, Patsy's and A16 doughs, you will see how tough it is to do.

Peter