Flours for NY style dough

[nostalgia]

Morning, all!  I've been puttering with breads and pizza for a couple of years now, and recently have been trying to find a really good formula for dough to make NY style pies.  I've been a King Arthur flour user, and it's been recently suggested that changing my flour might make my dough more manageable.

The one I use most is a 1 day dough, from a Wolfgang Puck recipe.  It uses 100% AP flour:

Food Network

It makes a nice handling dough than can be stretched and tossed, but the flavor is lacking.

I then went to a recipe from The Bread Baker's Apprentice.  It uses an overnight ferment, 50/50 bread/AP flour, and makes an extremely slack dough.  The taste was fantastic, but the dough was almost impossible to handle.  It tore very easily.

So, any suggestions for a relative newbie are more than welcome!

-Joe

[Pete-zza]

nostalgia,

If you are trying to make a standard NY style pizza, I believe that high-gluten flour is the best choice, followed by a good quality bread flour. If you look under the NY Style board, you will find links to several different formulations. I am pretty much familiar with all of them, so if you have any questions, feel free to ask.

Peter

[nostalgia]

If you are trying to make a standard NY style pizza, I believe that high-gluten flour is the best choice, followed by a good quality bread flour.

I was under the impression that bread flour is high-gluten.  Or is it just higher gluten than AP flour, but not as high-gluten as "high gluten" flour?

I'm going to have to build a wing on my kitchen to hold all of the flours I'm accumulating

-Joe

[Pete-zza]

nostalgia,

Your understanding is correct. Different millers and flour vendors use different terminology to characterize the protein and gluten contents of their flours. One miller's bread flour can have a protein content that is close to someone else's high-gluten flour. The King Arthur brands of flours tend to have higher protein contents than competing brands--pretty much across the line--so that in itself can add to the confusion. On this forum, the practice has been to distinguish between high-gluten and bread flours, if only to minimize confusion. But you are correct that bread flour can be considered as a high-gluten flour, and, as I mentioned, some millers refer to their bread flours as such. When in doubt, I usually try to look at the specs (if available) for the flour in question. At around 14% protein (it's 14.2% for the KASL), I know it is "high-gluten" for sure.

Peter

[Perk]

Actually I use KA Bread Flour, I've used it for several years, until I recently bought KASL

When I get my Cupto 00 pizza flour, I am going to do a test on
KASL vs KA Bread Flour vs Cupto 00 Pizza Flour.

Cupto 00 Pizza Flour -  Protein: 11.5%
KA AP flour - Proteinl: 11.7%
KA Bread Flour - Protein: 12.7%
KASL  - Protein: 14.2%

[nostalgia]

Thanks for the suggestions, all.  I just ordered up some KASL.  Can't wait to give 'er a try.

One more question:  I've read that high-protein flours can make the crust tough and chewy, which is why it's often blended with AP flour.  Does this not apply to NY style, since the crust is so thin?

Thanks again!

-Joe

[Pete-zza]

Joe,

I'm no expert on NY style pizzas as sold in NYC but it has not been my experience to get a tough crust in any of the several different NY style dough recipes I have tried. The crust can be chewy, but usually NY style doughs call for hydration levels of over 60% (my standard is around 63%). Depending on how you shape the rim of the skin before the skin is dressed, and assuming that there is ample yeast left at the time of baking to produce a good oven spring, the high hydration usually translates into a rim and crumb that can be light and airy yet chewy, and sometimes with a bit of crunch. Sometimes a NY crust can get a bit tough as it continues to "cook" for a while before it cools off--which is one of the reasons why some pizza operators use bread flour instead of high-gluten flour for home delivery pizzas--but even that effect can be mitigated to a certain extent by increasing the amounts of oil and sugar used. Or simply use a thicker crust.

Peter