butter instead of oil?

[elicheez]

Hey Folks,

Usually I make my dough with a few tbsp of oil. Lately I've made a few breads with butter and I really liked the flavor of the butter, especially in the crust. I thought I'd try it in my pizza dough. Substituted 2 tbsp melted butter for 2tbsp olive oil. The dough barely rose at all. 2 questions:
-anyone else try butter instead of oil?
-could butter instead of oil cause the lack of rise (old yeast is my other suspect)?

thanks!

[chiguy]

 Hi elicheez,
 By just replacing 2TBs of oil with melted butter alone would probably not have an extreme effect on yeast activity. Butter is cream and salt and although there is extra salt in the recipe 2TBs of butter only contains roughly 200mg's of sodium about 1/5 of a gram.
 My guess would be as good as your with possibly old yeast or another may be that kitchen temperature and refridgerators may be a bit cooler this time of year.         
 
You may want to read this Q&A on replacing oil with butter in pizza dough.
 http://www.pmq.com/mag/2006january-february/lehmann.php
 
Edit 1/5 of a gram                         Chiguy

[November]

2 tablespoons of salted butter contains approximately 22.8 g of fat, 4.4 g of water, and 400-450 mg of salt.  2 tablespoons of unsalted butter contains approximately 22.8 g of fat and 5 g of water.  You would need about 2.36 tablespoons, or 2 T and 1 t, of butter for a more accurate fat substitution.

[itsinthesauce]

What I have been told is that when you use butter, you need to increase the amount you use versus the amount of oil. Personally I think the taste is better, bet subtle.

[elicheez]

thanks! I have new yeast, I'll let you know how it goes.

[elicheez]

I replaced my usual 2tbsp oil with 3tbsp butter. And used new yeast. It was terrific. I recommend anyone who's always added oil to their dough try it.

[pkasten]

This is interesting.  Butter, being mostly saturated fat, is solid at refrigerator temperatures, unlike olive oil or corn oil.  In my last chicago style attempt ( http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,4377.0.html ), I pushed the fat to the limit (well, "limit," "way overboard," whatever) to get a really rich, biscuit-like crust, and actually got to the point where a teaspoon or so of oil leached out of my dough as it retarded.  I had been considering "going for the gusto" and making an even richer dough by substituting shortening for more of the oil, but, oddly enough, it didn't occur to me to use butter, my favorite fat of all.  It has more flavor, and if it's richness you're after, it can't be beat.

Paul

[pcampbell]

I noticed Tom Lehmann recommended 3% butter in this 30% whole wheat recipe. http://thinktank.pmq.com/viewtopic.php?p=34629&highlight=butter#34629 

I have been really trying to make the switch to 30%+ whole wheat (last one was 35% with 1% honey and 1% olive oil, and was OK, completely edible but nothing amazing) but wonder the benefits of adding butter or even oil to make a whole wheat pizza taste better, over eating white flour with no oil in it whatsoever.  I guess these are completely different aspects of health, with the whole wheat having more fiber and a lower glycemic index, but more fat and saturated fat at that (if you add oil/butter).  I suppose I could use less cheese to offset it (although we are only using about 6 oz of part skim on a 16" pizza)  I doubt that I could personally make a truly enjoyable 30-35% whole wheat pizza with simply salt and water in it.

At 2% instead of 3%, we're talking about 1 teaspoon of butter per pizza.  I guess in the scheme of things, that is not much!  I will probably give this a try...

[itnenaer]

i've used about 3-4% butter before...about 65-68% hydration.  I cant remember itwas years ago.  the dough came out pretty well.  the taste was fuller.. went well w/feta, spinach and fresh tomatoes

[Arj]

please........


DO NOT USE BUTTER in the dough......

I'm from Italy and I assure you that no one pizzaiolo here use butter.......The baker is another thing, the baker could use butter if he is doing "pane al latte" ,or "bread with milk" as translated in English (I'm sorry but my English is not good) but there aren't pizzaioli here with butter in their dough....

 

Arj

[Pete-zza]

Arj,

In the U.S., it is common to use butter in certain doughs, especially for the Chicago deep-dish doughs for deep-dish pizzas, which you are unlikely to see in Italy, although they are quite similar to some of the Easter pies (see, for example, http://www.giordanos.com/about.php). As for the Neapolitan style dough, I do not recall anyone on the forum talking about using butter in a such a dough, only oil. There has been some discussion of whether that oil should be olive oil or a seed oil, such as sunflower seed oil, but that has pretty much been the extent of that discussion.

Peter

[Arj]

Arj,

In the U.S., it is common to use butter in certain doughs, especially for the Chicago deep-dish doughs for deep-dish pizzas, which you are unlikely to see in Italy, although they are quite similar to some of the Easter pies (see, for example, giordanos.com/about.php). As for the Neapolitan style dough, I do not recall anyone on the forum talking about using butter in a such a dough, only oil. There has been some discussion of whether that oil should be olive oil or a seed oil, such as sunflower seed oil, but that has pretty much been the extent of that discussion.

Peter

I understand.... please do not hate me......

I've forgot that there are different kind of pizza in the world......sorry.

[Pete-zza]

Arj,

No need to apologize. I already like what you are doing with your posts and hope that you will continue to give us an Italian perspective on pizza making .

Peter

[Arj]

Arj,

No need to apologize. I already like what you are doing with your posts and hope that you will continue to give us an Italian perspective on pizza making .

Peter

pas de problemes, Peter!

I'm not a pizzaiolo, I'm just only a pizza-lover like many of you, and if you like my posts (and if you understand my horrible english  ) you must know that I'm of yours.....

Let me improve my movement across this forum and I'll write you what I know about pizza!(I always continue to search anything about it here in Italy and I propose you all I think you could find interesting! )
 

Arj