Having measured out 1/256 teaspoon of IDY for purposes of the photo at Reply 55 at
http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,7225.msg78615.html#msg78615, and not wanting to be wasteful, I decided to use that 1/256 teaspoon of IDY to make a pizza—in this case, a 14” pizza. With that small amount of yeast, I though that I might be able to get about 48 hours of room temperature fermentation, or about double what I originally achieved.
For purposes of the latest experiment, I used the same basic dough formulation as recited in the opening post of this thread at
http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,7225.0.html but with a few modifications. First, as noted above, I used 1/256 teaspoon of IDY, which is considerably less than what I originally used. Second, I decided to use King Arthur bread flour instead of KA all-purpose flour to see if that would be a better choice, especially for a NY style. Third, I used a hydration of 57%, which is 5% less than the rated absorption value of the KABF. This is the same approach as I used for the all-purpose dough in the opening post. The only other difference is that the temperature of the water I used for the latest experiment was about 48 degrees F, or about 3 degrees F higher than the 45 degrees F I originally used.
I used the expanded dough calculating tool at
http://www.pizzamaking.com/expanded_calculator.html to come up with the following dough formulation:
King Arthur Bread Flour (100%):
Water (57%):
IDY (0.00449%):
Salt (1.50%):
Total (158.50449%):
| 265.49 g | 9.36 oz | 0.59 lbs
151.33 g | 5.34 oz | 0.33 lbs
0.01 g | 0 oz | 0 lbs | 0 tsp | 0 tbsp
3.98 g | 0.14 oz | 0.01 lbs | 0.71 tsp | 0.24 tbsp
420.81 g | 14.84 oz | 0.93 lbs | TF = 0.096425
|
Note: Nominal thickness factor = 0.095; for a 14” pizza; bowl residue compensation = 1.5%
Primarily for the benefit of NY pizzastriver (Jim), I modified the output of the expanded dough calculator as given above to offer more complete data, as follows:
King Arthur Bread Flour (100%):
Water (57%):
IDY (0.00449%):
Salt (1.50%):
Total (158.50449%):
| 265.49 g | 9.36 oz | 0.59 lbs
151.33 g | 5.34 oz | 0.33 lbs
0.0117652 g | 0.0004149 oz | 0 lbs | 1/256 tsp | 0 tbsp
3.98 g | 0.14 oz | 0.01 lbs | 0.71 tsp | 0.24 tbsp
420.81 g | 14.84 oz | 0.93 lbs | TF = 0.096425
|
Note: Nominal thickness factor = 0.095; for a 14” pizza; bowl residue compensation = 1.5%
I prepared the dough almost exactly in the same manner as previously described in the opening post, including the sequencing of ingredients and mixer speeds and times. The finished dough temperature was 80.7 degrees F. The room temperature at which the dough was allowed to ferment was around 82 degrees F. To monitor the expansion of the dough, I used the poppy seed trick as described at
http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,6914.0.html. The first surprise was that the dough, even with only 1/256 teaspoon of IDY, rose much faster than I expected. Based on the increased spacing between the two poppy seeds, the dough doubled in volume in almost exactly 24 hours. Rather than using the dough at that point to make a pizza, which I believe was entirely possible, and instead of punching the dough down and letting it ferment for another 24 hours at room temperature, as I originally intended, I decided instead to modify the experiment by putting the dough into the refrigerator for the next 24 hours. I left the dough ball in its container and placed it into the refrigerator, without punching it down or doing anything else to it.
After the second 24-hour period of cold fermentation, I noticed that the dough had not changed volumetrically in any way as a result of putting it into the refrigerator. I let the dough ball sit at room temperature to warm up, for about an hour. The dough was then shaped and stretched into a 14” skin. The dough was extensible but I had no problems whatsoever in shaping and stretching the skin out to size. After dressing the pizza, it was baked in the same manner as described in the opening post.
The photos below show the finished pizza. It was very good. Although the finished crust was a bit lighter in color than the original pizza and with less oven spring, it was chewy and tasty and representative of a typical NY style pizza. As noted above, I used KABF instead of KAAP. I did not detect any advantage to using the KABF. As far as I am concerned, either type of flour can be used and the results should be equally good. Next time, I might be inclined to add a bit of sugar to the dough to get increased crust color development if I decide to ferment the dough beyond 24 hours.
So, the answer is, yes, it is possible to make a very good room-temperature fermented dough/pizza using only 1/256 teaspoon of IDY. Also, it is possible to hold the dough in “animated suspension” by putting it into the refrigerator after the initial 24 hours or room-temperature fermentation. This is a useful feature for those times where we find it necessary to delay things because of scheduling conflicts.
The next time I attempt a long room temperature fermentation along the lines discussed in this thread, I think I will cut the yeast in half, to 1/512 teaspoon of IDY, and see what happens.
Peter
