dough

[jesso]

I use Alton Brown's pizza dough recipe.  I seems pretty good.

I know high-gluten flour is prefered for pizza dough, BUT:

Why do most recipies on the Internet for pizza dough call for All Purpose Flour?

[canadianbacon]

Hi Jesso,

I am not any expert in this area, but I believe the short answer is... because all purpose flour is the most easily found in grocery stores, and secondly, most people ( 99% of these so-called expert sites that give out pizza dough recipes really don't have a clue what they are talking about.  )

Yes that's a pretty general statement, but I believe it to be very true.  Many of the very top websites for recipes are ones really for doughs that most people make, and most of them call for all purpose flour.  I just don't think these sites are educated on the fact that real pizza places use very high gluten flour.

You won't find any pizza sites out there owned by owers of real pizza places willing to give out there secret recipe for dough, - most of us at one time or other have scoured the net for "real" pizza recipes from reall pizza places and they are just not found.

One guy that used to frequent our club site here, worked at a pizza place... he gave out a recipe, and a day or 2 later he lost his job.  Not good stuff.  Some son of a gun must have turned him in, either they overheard him talking about his posting of the secret recipe, and wanted to get him in trouble.

Anyway many others can jump in on this topic.

Btw, thanks to the owner of the site, Steve updated software, and your quick response was because we have a new option available to us now that lets us get email notifications of ALL new posts to our
club website.

The Pizza Lover.

[Pete-zza]

The Pizza Lover has it right.  There are many types of pizzas that use different kinds of flours, including specialty flours.  In your local supermarket you will find the all-purpose flour and, in many cases, bread flour.  But you will almost never find high-gluten flour.  I have spoken to people at Bay State Milling and King Arthur and was told that there is not enough demand for high-gluten flour at the retail level.  The bulk of the demand for high-gluten flour comes from professional bakers, and they buy in bulk, usually in bags of 50 pounds and at far lower prices per pound than they would pay if the flour was available in 5-lb. bags in the supermarkets. 

There are places where you can buy high-gluten flour in bulk (e.g., 50-lb. bags), such as at chefswarehouse.com, or you can buy the King Arthur Sir Lancelot high-gluten flour in 5-lb. bags from King Arthur.  Some wholesalers and food distributors might also sell you the big bags if you show up with cash in hand and meet minimum purchase requirements.  A local pizza operator might also sell you some high-gluten flour.

Under the circumstances, you can see why most Internet pizza dough recipes, and cookbook recipes as well, call for all-purpose flour more than any other flour.

Peter

[canadianbacon]

Phew 

Thanks for backing me up there Pete-zza 

[Randy]

Most of us have experimented with every flour we could get our hands on still High Gluten has a much better flavor.  Don't try adding high gluten supliment.  It is a waist of good flour.
http://www.kingarthurflour.com/cgibin/start/ahome/main.html

Randy

[Pete-zza]

I agree with Randy that if you can get high-gluten flour to start with you should do that, and the King Arthur Sir Lancelot flour is one of the best.  I also wouldn't recommend buying a lower-gluten flour and adding vital wheat gluten just to save on cost (including the high cost of shipping KASL to you).  However, there are times when you don't have a high-gluten flour available to use and, under those circumstances, I am an advocate of adding vital wheat gluten to boost the protein content of a lower-gluten flour to be able to make a NY style pizza dough.  I have done this several times while visiting friends and family out of state.  Rather than bringing a bag of KASL with me, I bring a small amount of vital wheat gluten and use it with whatever flour I find or buy at the other end.  The results to date have been very good under the circumstances.

Peter

[Pizzaholic]

Just a bit of information that I can add.
I havent ordered flour in a long time. I have a couple of sources ( Pizza place I most frequent, a bakery that I go to once in a while) that will sell me high gluten flour for about $3.00 for 5lbs.
I cannot beat the price or the convenience. The pizza place even gave me some sauce real cheap too.
I do go to these places and have developed a report with the owners or managers, and really dont think twice about selling me their flour.  JUst ask for it.
Pizzaholic