Please help with dough.

[cdutchy]

I have access to a set of Y-600's and have been working on a New York style dough recipe for baking in them. I started out with All Trumps (mainly because I've been told it's one of the best) as my flour but after my first several pizzas in the deck the crust isn't turning out the way I want it to. The edges are baking and browning fine but the bottoms are a little too "crackery" to my liking. If eaten right after removal from the ovens you get a very definite "crunch" with each bite. There's also a little bit of a doughy layer between sauce and crust. Right now I'm baking on screens the entire time at around 550 (tried to decrease to 525 and still got the same crunchy bottoms.

My dough percentages are at:

water 58%
salt 1.5%
oil 2%
IDY 0.5%

Now...a few points to clarify what I've done thus far:

-I have been baking them with only sauce, no cheese or other toppings. The ovens I have access to are in a store that's being closed so I don't have a full product line to work with and I thought they had cheese left in stock but they didn't. Until I can get to the local restaurant depot all I have is dough and sauce. Could this be a factor in the bottoms cooking too much causing this crackery feel?

-Is All Trumps used predominantly for this "crispy" bottom? I prefer a bottom with a little less crunch, but I'm not experienced enough to know if it's the flour, dough formulation, cooking heat/time, or a combination of the three. The son of the owner has shown me the ropes as far as actually making the dough and use of the mixer is concerned, so I'm confident he knows what he's doing (plus he's been mixing their dough for a few years...although not All Trumps). If All Trumps is the reason for this, I'm assuming a lower protein % flour is in order?

-I've adjusted the top and bottom heat baffles to allow more top heat but it didn't really make that much of a difference.

Any ideas/feedback/suggestions?

I'm relatively new to the "making your own dough" concept as my previous experience has been in a store that had their dough delivered daily and used conveyors.

Edit: More details...All ingredients are wieghed. The dough is coming out of the mixer at 85 degrees. Scaled, balled then cross-stacked for 90 minutes then nested. Pies made at the 48 hrs mark.

[Pete-zza]

cdutchy,

I was going to suggest that you register at the PMQ Think Tank and pose your questions there, but I see that you have already done so. Tom Lehmann often visits the PMQ Think Tank to address problems reported on there, such as yours, but if he doesn't appear over the next few days, you may want to send him an email at tlehmann@aibonline.org. He is usually very good at responding to people who email him.

I don't have any experience with or intimate knowledge of the Y-600 deck ovens, but I don't think that I would change the dough formulation until you have had a chance to bake a pizza with cheese and toppings, not just sauce. The All Trumps flour is perhaps the most commonly used flour for NY style pizzas baked in deck ovens. I recently made a test pizza using a member's dough formulation and method in which half the pizza had only sauce and the other half had sauce, cheese and toppings. I found that the two halves baked up quite differently. I discussed my results at http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,6285.msg54384.html#msg54384 (Reply 18).

Offhand, I don't see anything out of order with your dough formulation. The All Trumps flour can easily handle a hydration greater than 58% but 58% is a common hydration value among professional pizza operators. Your dough management procedures seem to be correct. I assume that your pizza sizes are the same as the owner's son has been using and that the problem is not with using new sizes and different dough ball weights. It may be that the ovens needs some kind of adjustment to allow your new doughs to work properly with those ovens.

Good luck. If you find the source of your problem, I hope you will come back and tell us how you solved it.

Peter

[scott r]

It is possible that your dough was not properly mixed, proofed or a combination of the two.  If Tom can't help you come back with more details and pictures. 

[cdutchy]

Mixing:
     *Added water at 58 degrees
     *Added salt
     *Added flour at 25 lbs
     *Added Yeast

Mixed on low (speed 1) for 2 mins, then speed 2 until all flour was picked up.
   
     *Added Oil

Mixed low for 2 mins, then speed 2 for 12 minutes.

Immediately scaled, balled and were cross-stacked within 20 minutes. Wiped with oil as well.
Nested together after 90 minutes and baked 24-48 hours later.
     

[Pete-zza]

cdutchy,

Your method for making the dough is pretty much the classic Lehmann method.

Out of curiosity, did the owner's son use pizza screens? A lot of pizza places use them with deck ovens but it adds another step to the process. Often the screens are used because the oven is not working properly (the deck is too hot). Using the screens keeps the bottoms of the crusts from burning by lifting the crusts off of the deck surface. Many operators slip the pizzas off of the screens directly onto the deck toward the end of the bake in order to get better bottom crispiness. Some slip the screens under the pizzas toward the end of the bake to keep the pizzas from burning. Getting rid of the screens means having to train the workers to use peels. A lot of operators prefer using the screens because there is little training needed, especially with a work force that turns over a lot.

Peter

[cdutchy]

Yes...we did use screens for all the pies from my dough. This is the only way I've ever known to accurately make the required size of skin for precisely the reasons you stated.

I have in the past stoned the pie for the last minute or so to get a little more cook on the crust, but not always. No other reason for not baking directly on the deck than experience, more or less.

Ton did answer my post on pmq and he did suggest that I not use the screens, which I'm willing to try to see if it solves my problem. But I'll be honest, I have no clue how to consistently  and quickly make a 10,12,14 or 16" crust without using the screen, and when we finally re-open or get around to opening up my own place, I obviously lack the experience in not using screens to adequately train my employees to do it either.

Tom also suggested I get an oven thermometer to measure my oven temp, perhaps the ovens are off and when I think I'm baking at 550 I may in fact be much higher.

I'll keep you posted...thanks so much for your responses.

[Pete-zza]

cdutchy,

A lot of operators have switched to conveyors so that they can turn out pizzas quickly and consistently using low cost labor. However, unless you use something like a Lincoln Fast Bake and some of the new "hearth" style perforated disks from pizzatools.com, it is hard to get an authentic type NY style using a conveyor. Some customers, especially those who have had the real thing in NYC, won't even go to a place that uses conveyors to make the NY style unless they have no other choice. I have read of operators who have bought decks only because everyone else in their area making NY style pizzas were using decks.

Peter