Perfect Giordano's-style Crust!

[Perk]

That crust looks golden brown, the Buttering of the pan looks like it gave it that butter flavor
which to me would be excellent.
Never tried Chicago Style.
I looks good

Da Bears

[foodblogger]

I made 2 pies last night with this recipe.  I learned a few things. 

For 3 nine inch pies or one regular style 9 inch deep dish and 1 stuffed crust:

3 T olive oil
3/4 cup canola oil (I use corn oil)
3 t sugar
1 1/2 t sea salt
1 1/2 c warm water
6 cups flour (if you weigh like I do it is 2 pounds)
3 t yeast


I followed Buzz's directions for making the dough.  I made a regular deep dish 9 inch with sausage and pepperoni.  For the deep dish I used 12 oz of sliced Kraft moz. cheese.  Because a deep dish can sometimes get too watery I precooked the sausage. 

I make a modification to the straight 6-in-1 on top of the pies.  I drain the 6-in-1 through a strainer for just a few seconds to get a little of the juice off.  Then I mix the drained tomatos with 1 tablespoon sea salt.  I put the sauce on the pie and then sprinkle with a little oregano and parmesan.

For the stuffed pie I mixed 10 oz shredded Kraft moz. with some fully drained and squeezed frozen spinach.  In the bottom of the stuffed crust pan I rubbed copious butter.  In the bottom of the regular deep dish pan I put a few T of olive oil.  I then baked both pies on the bottom rack at 450.  I put my baking stone on the top rack of the oven to provide a little radiant heat from the top.

Lessons learned from this experiment:

1)  If you are going to use butter in your pan instead of oil, don't cook the pizza on the bottom rack.  The butter will burn the bottom of the crust by the time the pizza is cooked.  The stuffed pie was very good, but the bottom was burnt.  The deep dish (olive oil in the bottom of the pan) was absolutely perfect.

2)  Rolling the dough out and then placing it in the pan will produce a more consistently thin crust than if you put the dough in the bottom of the pan and push it out with your fingers.  I prefer my crust with a few irregularities in it, so in the future I will probably push the dough out with my hands instead of rolling it out first. 

[buzz]

if you want to be authentic--

I believe that Giordano's greases their pans with margarine.

They use canola oil with a little olive oil.

6-in-1 tomatoes with some red pepper flakes (there is a hot spiciness to the sauce). Their sauce is very salty, but 1 TBS per 1 can of 28-0z. tomatoes sounds excessively salty! I've never had a problem with 6-in-1's being watery.

Stella mozzarella.

Roll out the dough instead of pressing it in by hand--they run their dough through a sheeter twice.

[foodblogger]

if you want to be authentic--

I believe that Giordano's greases their pans with margarine.

They use canola oil with a little olive oil.

6-in-1 tomatoes with some red pepper flakes (there is a hot spiciness to the sauce). Their sauce is very salty, but 1 TBS per 1 can of 28-0z. tomatoes sounds excessively salty! I've never had a problem with 6-in-1's being watery.

Stella mozzarella.

Roll out the dough instead of pressing it in by hand--they run their dough through a sheeter twice.

Thanks for the advice.  I have a real hard time finding things like Stella mozzarella.  I was born in Chicago, lived in Iowa for a while, went back to Chicago and then left again after medical school.  I have unfortunately had to learn about substitution for some of the harder to find ingredients.  Thank goodness that I can still get 6 in 1 tomatoes.  In general I like a little saltier sauce but that probably comes more from the Gino's background than anything that Giordano's ever did.  I really enjoyed experimenting with your recipe.  Thank you for posting it.  I can tell that you have put a lot of effort into it.

[Chicago Rules!!!]

It sure does look like delicious Mozzarella

[foodblogger]

Stella looks awesome in the photo.  I pine away for some.  From what I remember it was one of the drier mozzarellas.  I think the pizza turns out a little better with a drier cheese.  Believe it or not, the store brand 'Best Choice' at Kansas City 'Hen House' grocery stores is actually a very good cheese for making deep dish pizza.

[buzz]

Stella is excellent stuff! If you can't find it, try Sorrento. If not that, then Frigo--it's not nearly as good as the first two, but it's decent. Also, Safeway markets their own brands of cheeses (in bricks--in Chicago under the "Dominick's label)--I haven't tried the mozzarella yet, but the rest I've had are very good.

[Hi Gluten]

I went to Sam's Club yesterday and looked for Stella, as recommended by several members. Found it in both block and shredded forms. Gotta a new batch of dough made up and will give it a whirl.

Thanx to all for the recommendation! 

[Locke]

Inspired by pyegal in the previous thread http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,1184.msg21731.html#msg21731 I decided to try using myu  cast iron skillet for a deep dish pan. This wasn't exactly buzz's dough recipe as I cut down on the oil a bit and used "only" 4TBS. I also pressed the dough directly into the pan instead of rolling it out because I was feeling too lazy to clean the counter after rolling. Sauce was a 28oz can of Progresso crushed tomatoes(no 6in1 I'm sure) slightly drained. I think the crust is a tad too thick but I'm very pleased with it as a first attempt.

[Chicago Rules!!!]

I scaled the recipe to 3 cups of flour. This is my hot fennel sausage pizza. And i added 1/4 cup corn meal.

[chiguy]

 Hey Chicago Rules,
 Once again a great looking pizza, it looks like the real thing.
 At Giordnanos they do not use corn meal, but i have been adding some lately and like the taste and texture.    Chiguy

[Chicago Rules!!!]

thanks Chiguy, next time ill ommit the cornmeal, even though it taste good.

[PizzaPolice]

Good job, kid.   

[home made]

Hey Buzz, first time post on this site. I've made pizza a home for a long time. Visited Chicago in Feb. and went to the Giordano's near the Sears Towerl. Loved it. Got some sauce on the stove right now. Just wanted to ask about the long rise time. The crust I make I let rise once, punch it down and let rise again. (about 3 hrs) What does the longer rise time do? Thanks, Dave

[buzz]

Home made--

Glad you liked Giordano's! I don't personally cook the sauce--I don't think Giordano's does, either, although I haven't verified it. I know they use 6-in-1 tomatoes, and someone told me that they buy prepared sauce from 6-in-1.

About the proofing time--I only punch the dough down once, at the end of the proof time (about 8 hours usually). The long proofing time gives the dough a chance to develop more flavor. You can do a 24-hour refigerator rise, too--just make sure that you let the dough come back to room temperature the next day!

[home made]

Thanks for the reply. Got another question. I've never seen any 6-1 tomatoes. Is this just 6 differant types of tomatoes in 1 can? I always use crushed tomatoes, cooked down with some seasoning it.
Thanks, Dave

[gottabedapan]

Thanks for the reply. Got another question. I've never seen any 6-1 tomatoes. Is this just 6 differant types of tomatoes in 1 can?

6 in 1 is the brand name of a premier ground tomato product packaged by Escalon Premier Brands, located in Esclon, CA.

[buzz]

You can order directly from Escalaon, or look for a brand of ground tomatoes in your grocery store. If you can't find ground, then used crushed (S&W, Contadina and Progresso are good). Even 6-in-1's can be bitter, and other brands can be very bitter, so I always add a tsp of sugar to a 28-oz. can.

Personally, I like an uncooked sauce better than a cooked one--you can experiment with both to see what appeals to you!