Noobie help

[roadtrash]

I just want to start out by saying, this site rocks. I found this site about three days ago and have logged in many hours reading. I became fed up with pizza dough recipes I found on the net. I have tried several, over the last few years with varying success. I finally found out were the pizza guru's reside.


My goal is, eventually, to make a NY pizza, but I'm gonna start out with a Randy variation since I cant find high gluten flour. I'm limited to what tools and ingredients I have to work with. I picked up 5 pounds of White lily bread flour. First question, how to I find out what the glutton level of this flour is? 

Here Are the tools I have
Bread flour
pizza stone and peal
food processor
active dry yeast
kitchen scale


This is the only one I can find using bread flour

16 oz Bread flour

9.8  oz Water by weight(warm 120deg.  F

1 TBS  sugar

1 TBS Honey

1 Tablespoon  Classico Olive Oil or vegtable oil

2  Teaspoon Salt

1 1./2 teaspoons bread machine yeast

Mix flour sugar and salt.  Put yeast and half the flourmixture  in the mixer.  Mix the honey and oil into the very warm water.  Pour mixture into bowl and place mixer using dough hook on stir for about 2 minutes.  Stop mixer. Add the rest of the flour, then set mixer to stir until the dough pulls from the sides of the bowl then stop mixer for 5 minutes.  After the 5 minutes, go to speed 2 for 12 minutes.   On a lightly floured surface shape into a ball  Place in the refrigerator in a lightly sealed container coated with olive oil overnight or up to three days.

Remove 3  hours before panning
Remove from the fridge and flatten then fold, then shape into a ball using wet hands.
Makes a 16-18” pizza or two 12” pizzas


I"m gonna start out doing 12" pizzas for practice. I'm not really sure how to put this together using the tools I have. How much active dry yeast to use. If the sugar is to much using a pizza stone. How to put it all together using a food processor. I would like to do at least a 24 hour retard to get as much flavor out of the bread flour as possible. To autolyze or not. This site is full of info, but can be a little intimidating.


My goal, of course is to make perfect pizza at home. I plan on investing more time and money in the future. I'm thinking of getting a stand mixer, and a pizza screen, but it might take a few weeks. I would like to order some high gluten flour on the net, if I can find a source.

I plan to document my progress in this thread with pictures


Thanks in advance for any help I can get

[Pete-zza]

Roadtrash,

The recipe you posted is a very good one and at some point you should definitely try it. You might have to cut the recipe in half, however, if you plan to use a food processor because the recipe you posted will produce about 28 ounces of dough, which will be too much even for a 14-cup food processor.

If it is really a NY style dough recipe using bread flour that you are after, then you might consider what is called the Lehmann NY style dough recipe. Using the new Lehmann dough calculation tool that was put on the website yesterday, at http://www.pizzamaking.com/dough_calculator.html, I put in numbers that should allow you to make a 12-inch dough using bread flour and active dry yeast (ADY). This is the recipe:

Flour (100%):           203.88 g  |  7.19 oz | 0.45 lbs
Water (62%):           126.41 g  |  4.46 oz | 0.28 lbs
Oil (1%):                   2.04 g | 0.07 oz | 0 lbs | 0.44 tsp | 0.15 tbsp
Salt (1.75%):            3.57 g | 0.13 oz | 0.01 lbs | 0.64 tsp | 0.21 tbsp
ADY (0.375%):          0.76 g | 0.03 oz | 0 lbs | 0.2 tsp | 0.07 tbsp
Sugar (0%):              0 g | 0 oz | 0 lbs | 0 tsp | 0 tbsp
Total (165.125%):    336.66 g | 11.88 oz | 0.74 lbs

Before using your food processor, I suggest that you first read this thread: http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,2189.msg19289.html#msg19289. The discussion at that thread covers just about all you will need to know to make a NY style dough in a food processor, including autolyse and how to hydrate and use the ADY. I can’t tell you exactly how the White Lily flour will work for this application. White Lily flours tend in general to have lower protein/gluten content than competing flours, although the White Lily website does say that their bread flour is a high-protein high-gluten flour. In your case, I would hold back a bit of the formula water and add it only if the dough looks too dry when you are just about done.

Once the dough had been prepared, and maybe even before you make your dough, you might want to read this thread, or at least the parts most relevant to what you plan to do, at http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,2223.msg19503.html#msg19503. You will even see a 12-inch Lehmann dough formulation similar to the above dough formulation (at Reply 8), but with some slight modifications. I think you will find the posts starting at Reply 8 to cover most of the steps you may want to use once you have made your dough.

I think I have covered all the points raised in your post. You have all the ingredients and tools to make a NY style dough and pizza. If there are any remaining questions after you have finished your homework, feel free to ask. You might even want to consider a different NY style. If, for example, you prefer a NY style dough that is more breadlike and with a sweeter crust, you might consider the Canadave NY style dough recipe at http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,2175.msg19124.html#msg19124. The Canadave recipe can also be rescaled using the new Dough Calculating Tool referenced above. I can help you with the calculations if you wish.

Peter

[roadtrash]

pete,


Thanks for the reply. I tried the recipe you gave me. The only thing I change was a small pinch of sugar in the yeast, while proofing. I used the food processor to knead, and it worked great. I never would have thought a processor would work that well for doughs. I pulsed for around 25-30 seconds until it balled up on the shaft. I removed from the mixer, and into the fridge for 48 hours. 

Removed from fridge.  It sat on the counter for about two hours. It was then at about 60 degrees. stretched out to 12 inches rather easy. Toppings were Canadian bacon, pepperoni, onion, and bell pepper. The oven was at 500 for about 45 minutes. Cooked on a stone for 8 minutes.


It turned out good, but not great. The crust was a little to chewy for my taste. Is there anything I can do to crisp it up? My cheese almost got too brown before the bottom was done.

sorry about the bad pics, am working on that too.




 

[Pete-zza]

roadtrash,

For a newbie, I would say that you did extremely well.

I have on more than one occasion stated that I think that the food processor is underrated as a dough making machine. So long as the dough is not overkneaded or overheated, the results can be very good. Looking at your photos, it looks like you managed the process very well. You got a good rim and an open crumb with good-sized voids.

Chewiness and crispiness are terms that vary in meaning from one person to another but chewiness is usually governed by the type of flour used and the hydration level (the ratio of the weight of water to the weight of flour). In your case, the hydration, at 62%, was high enough that it should not have been a factor. In a future effort, you might try mixing a bit of regular flour in with the bread flour to soften the mix, but you may have to lower the amount of water a bit. On the matter of crispiness, you may also find this thread of value: http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,3269.msg27700.html#msg27700.

To get more crispiness, one of the best ways to get it is to lower the oven temperature when you put the pizza into the oven, say, to 450-475 degrees F, and let the pizza bake for longer at the lower temperature. The longer bake will allow the protein in the dough to become further denatured and release more water from the dough (in the form of steam) and result in a crispier crust with a bit more color. In your case, the longer bake can also be a help in cooking the wet toppings like peppers and onions. You didn't indicate what oven rack position you used, but that can also be a factor in the results you get. This is one of those cases where you may have to play around with your oven rack positions, including where best to put the stone and moving the pizza from one level to another to get the best results.

When using a pizza stone, I let it preheat for an hour. I can't say that your 45-minute preheat wasn't long enough, but maybe next time you can try one hour. Sometime you might also try making a simple cheese and tomato pizza. That is kind of a baseline pizza but it may tell you a lot about how your oven works. When you use a lot of toppings, you can spend too much of your time trying to figure out how to get all of the toppings and cheeses cooked and get the right crust texture and color. The hardest pizza to bake, even by professionals, is one with a lot of toppings, especially vegetables. The pizza crusts will invariably be too wet and maybe even a bit too chewy.

You should be very pleased with your results even if you didn't exactly what you wanted. As you gain more experience, your pizzas will get better, especially once you get to know your oven better.

Peter

[varasano]

I agree, for a newbie that looked good.