Essen1's NY-style pizza project

[Pete-zza]

Mike,

Those pizzas do look great. Can you tell us if the flour blend included the King Arthur bread flour and the Stone Buhr flour and, if so, how much of each by weight you used, before adding the VWG?

I see that you altered the preferment components from what you previously used, by increasing the water component (to yield a hydration for the preferment of about 122%), adding some sugar and adding all of the yeast. Can you tell us what led you to do that?

Peter

[Mad_Ernie]

Mike:

I completely echo Norma's comments.  Excellent looking pizzas. 

Sehr gut!

-ME

[Essen1]

Norma & ME,

Thank you for the kind words. The pies were indeed "sehr gut!"  I think I'm getting where I want to be regarding my crust. Or at least now I know that it is possible to make an authentic NY-style pizza right in your home oven.

Mike,

Those pizzas do look great. Can you tell us if the flour blend included the King Arthur bread flour and the Stone Buhr flour and, if so, how much of each by weight you used, before adding the VWG?

I see that you altered the preferment components from what you previously used, by increasing the water component (to yield a hydration for the preferment of about 122%), adding some sugar and adding all of the yeast. Can you tell us what led you to do that?

Peter

Peter,

I know what you're thinking. 

And I'm aware that the entire way of how I went about the poolish protocol is unconventional at best. It was basically a spur-of-the-moment decision to add half the sugar. Call it silly, but I was afraid that the yeast, since it's the entire amount, might run out of food since the poolish only contains half the flour so I split the sugar amount and added half to the poolish. I know that it goes against what the Pros suggest and advise but so far I haven't run into any problems at all by adding sugar to the poolish.

In regards to the flour blend, I stuck with only one flour - the KABF - since I didn't want to have it become too complicated with the addition of the VWG. I wanted to see first how that works out before I start using flour blends again, well...if I do at all again.

Some people might be shaking their heads when they read what I did but I encourage those to try the dough formula, given that they have some VWG laying around the house, and post the feedback here. It would be very much appreciated. The crust is very good. When I first bit into it I had somewhat of a "Wow" moment, and that doesn't happen very often. 

[Pete-zza]

Mike,

There are a thousand ways to skin a cat and there are no laws or rules that say that you have to make and use preferments in certain ways only. There are literally hundreds of ways, maybe thousands of ways, to concoct and use preferments. But, I am always more interested in why people do things than the what part. For example, why did you use a higher than normal hydration for your "poolish"? I also wondered why you added sugar to the preferment. The reason is that yeast feeds off of simple sugars only and it can take many hours for table sugar (sucrose) to be converted to simple sugars to feed the yeast. It perhaps didn't matter in your case because the prefermentation period was short, only three hours. Under these conditions, most of the yeast and sugar were available for the final mix. Sometime you might repeat your dough recipe and add the sugar to the final mix to see if there is a noticeable difference.

I double checked your VWG calculation and it is correct .

Peter

[Essen1]

I double checked your VWG calculation and it is correct .

Peter

Whew!

Honestly, I double and triple checked the numbers before posting because if I had posted the wrong ones again it probably would have landed me in the forum's doghouse this time. 

As to the Why?, to be honest that was just a mere experiment but it turned out very well and I'm glad I did it. But thank you for the clarification on the yeast and simple sugars. My train of thought at that time was that since I increased or used the entire amount of yeast, it might be beneficial to add half of the organic sugar to the "poolish". I'm no scientist and not a Pro by any means but it made sense to me.

However, with my next batch I will take your suggestion and add the sugar to the final mix and see if that has an impact on the outcome.

[Essen1]

Well, the 63% hydration crust was great but it seems I'm back to my old dilemma...crust coloration. 

I don't know what it is specifically but it looks like the crusts I made with a lower hydration had much better coloration than this one, even though the temp was temp was around 625° F when the first pie went in. However, the oven spring and characteristics of the one with 63% wasn't much different than the lower hydration ones.

Here's the formula. It's for two dough balls, 375 gr each with a 1% bowl compensation.

Flour (100%):      450.36 g  |  15.89 oz | 0.99 lbs   (439 gr KABF / 11 gr VWG)
Water (63%):      283.72 g  |  10.01 oz | 0.63 lbs
IDY (.7%):      3.15 g | 0.11 oz | 0.01 lbs | 1.05 tsp | 0.35 tbsp
Salt (2%):      9.01 g | 0.32 oz | 0.02 lbs | 1.61 tsp | 0.54 tbsp
Oil (1%):              4.5 g | 0.16 oz | 0.01 lbs | 1 tsp | 0.33 tbsp
Sugar (1.5%):      6.76 g | 0.24 oz | 0.01 lbs | 1.69 tsp | 0.56 tbsp

Total (168.2%):   757.5 g | 26.72 oz | 1.67 lbs | TF = N/A

Single Ball:    378.75 g | 13.36 oz | 0.83 lbs

The mixing procedure and fermentation was exactly the same as I used before and described in my previous post. Nor has the amount of VWG changed. I'm thinking that when I increased the water amount I should have, perhaps, also increased the sugar amount but I don't know if that would have made a significant difference?

Some pics...one was a sausage, mushroom and olives pie and the other a plain cheese.

[Essen1]

And the rest...

[Pete-zza]

Mike,

Can you tell me how many hours of cold fermentation your 63% hydration dough received?

Peter

[Essen1]

Mike,

Can you tell me how many hours of cold fermentation your 63% hydration dough received?

Peter

Peter,

I made the dough at 11:00 am on Monday and let it bulk rise until 9:00 am on Tuesday morning, when I divided them and they went straight back into the fridge until I got home from work around 7:00pm. The dough was used last night around 9:00 pm.

So the entire fermentation time was 34 hrs.

[Pete-zza]

Mike,

It's possible that your dough was depleted of residual sugars, with too little left at the time of baking to yield adequate crust coloration. Consider the following. A classic poolish, by definition, has a hydration of 100%. Your hydration was 22% higher, at 122%. The higher hydration will lead to an accelerated prefermention of your "poolish". A classic 3-4 hour room temperature poolish uses around 0.5% IDY. You used 40% more, specifically, 0.70%. That will mean more prefermentation of your "poolish", with the yeast gobbling up natural sugars in the flour at a pretty rapid rate as they are available as food for the yeast. A classic poolish uses water at a temperature of 60 degrees F. You used water that was 58.3% higher, at 95 degrees F. At that temperature, your "poolish" will be off to the races and will ferment even faster. I suspect that your room temperature was below 80 degrees F. This would offset some of the other factors. However, on balance, you had a really turbo-charged "poolish" with a lot of biochemical activity. Add to this the 20 minute rest period and other time spent at room temperature to get the dough ready for the refrigerator, it seems plausible that your "poolish" left you with too little residual sugar in the dough to last another 32 hours in the refrigerator even as the amylase enzymes continued to extract natural sugars from the dough during refrigeration, and for the remaining two hours at room temperature.

The matter of low residual sugar levels and their effect on oven spring and crust coloration (and also pH levels) came up recently in the JerryMac thread in a series of posts starting at Reply 136 at http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,5851.msg86732.html#msg86732. You might want to read those posts, and particularly the colloquy between scott123 and me, to see if they apply to your situation. I personally don't see that the 63% hydration you used, or the notion of adding more sugar to compensate for the higher hydration, are material factors in your outcome. You might have added more sugar to guarantee higher residual sugar levels, but not as a compensatory measure to counteract the higher hydration of your dough.

Peter

[Essen1]

Mike,

It's possible that your dough was depleted of residual sugars, with too little left at the time of baking to yield adequate crust coloration. Consider the following. A classic poolish, by definition, has a hydration of 100%. Your hydration was 22% higher, at 122%. The higher hydration will lead to an accelerated prefermention of your "poolish". A classic 3-4 hour room temperature poolish uses around 0.5% IDY. You used 40% more, specifically, 0.70%. That will mean more prefermentation of your "poolish", with the yeast gobbling up natural sugars in the flour at a pretty rapid rate as they are available as food for the yeast. A classic poolish uses water at a temperature of 60 degrees F. You used water that was 58.3% higher, at 95 degrees F. At that temperature, your "poolish" will be off to the races and will ferment even faster. I suspect that your room temperature was below 80 degrees F. This would offset some of the other factors. However, on balance, you had a really turbo-charged "poolish" with a lot of biochemical activity. Add to this the 20 minute rest period and other time spent at room temperature to get the dough ready for the refrigerator, it seems plausible that your "poolish" left you with too little residual sugar in the dough to last another 32 hours in the refrigerator even as the amylase enzymes continued to extract natural sugars from the dough during refrigeration, and for the remaining two hours at room temperature.

The matter of low residual sugar levels and their effect on oven spring and crust coloration (and also pH levels) came up recently in the JerryMac thread in a series of posts starting at Reply 136 at http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,5851.msg86732.html#msg86732. You might want to read those posts, and particularly the colloquy between scott123 and me, to see if they apply to your situation. I personally don't see that the 63% hydration you used, or the notion of adding more sugar to compensate for the higher hydration, are material factors in your outcome. You might have added more sugar to guarantee higher residual sugar levels, but not as a compensatory measure to counteract the higher hydration of your dough.

Peter

Peter,

Thanks for the update and detailed info.

I have a question, though. When you say that a classic preferment or poolish has a 100% hydration, do you mean in correlation to the amount of flour used in the poolish, i.e. 100 gr of flour & 100 gr of water, or are you referring to the total amount of water used in the dough formula?

What I'm getting at, and if I understood you correctly, is that if I use 50% of the total amount of flour, which would make that 225 gr according to the latest dough formula I posted, I should then also only use 225 gr of water and not the entire amount of 284 gr (rounded up), leaving 59 gr of water for the final mix, correct?

[Essen1]

Peter,

I forgot to ask...

How come that the pies I made with a lower hydration and that were made following the same process in regards to the poolish, didn't experience the coloration flaws the last pies did? Do you have any ideas? I'm kind of stumped, to be honest.

[Pete-zza]

I have a question, though. When you say that a classic preferment or poolish has a 100% hydration, do you mean in correlation to the amount of flour used in the poolish, i.e. 100 gr of flour & 100 gr of water, or are you referring to the total amount of water used in the dough formula?

What I'm getting at, and if I understood you correctly, is that if I use 50% of the total amount of flour, which would make that 225 gr according to the latest dough formula I posted, I should then also only use 225 gr of water and not the entire amount of 284 gr (rounded up), leaving 59 gr of water for the final mix, correct?

Mike,

Yes. The hydration of the poolish is the ratio of the water used in the poolish to the flour used in the poolish, both by weight. If you used 50 percent of the formula flour, or roughly 225 grams, you would use 225 grams of water in the poolish. However, while you and JerryMac used all of the formula water for your "poolish" in your respective dough recipes, usually one uses poolish in an amount that is equal 20-80% of the total formula water (if a classic poolish is desired).

In your case, if excessive maturation/fermentation was at fault, the way that one would usually try to redress that problem is to use diastatic malt, or in rare cases according to Professor Calvel, some table sugar (sucrose).

I don't want to suggest that you jettison the methods you have been using. Although I suspect the rules that apply to classic forms of preferment exist for a reason, if you are satisfied with the results you have been achieving then you should by all means continue to use them. I am just trying to get you to ask, and hopefully answer, the "why" questions if you choose to deviate from the basic rules.

Peter

[Pete-zza]

I forgot to ask...

How come that the pies I made with a lower hydration and that were made following the same process in regards to the poolish, didn't experience the coloration flaws the last pies did? Do you have any ideas? I'm kind of stumped, to be honest.

Mike,

I got the impression from Reply 298 at http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,8093.msg86703.html#msg86703 that the lower hydration doughs got 24 hours of cold fermentation, not 32 hours. That difference may have accounted for the different outcomes. Otherwise, we would have to look for other explanations.

Peter

[Essen1]

Mike,

I got the impression from Reply 298 at http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,8093.msg86703.html#msg86703 that the lower hydration doughs got 24 hours of cold fermentation, not 32 hours. That difference may have accounted for the different outcomes. Otherwise, we would have to look for other explanations.

Peter

Peter,

I'll try the regular poolish with my next batch and will also check out your advice and add the sugar to the final mix.

However, as I said in Reply 298, I had some of the dough balls that received a 36-hr fermentation since I couldn't eat 4 pies in one sitting. The ones who, inadvertently, did go the 36-hr distance turned out just as good as the ones who only did a 24-hr fermentation in regards of crust color.

Sometimes I think it's my oven but then again, the temps have all been steady for the most part and have hovered all in the 600° F - 625° F range.

I'm thinking of making those doughs, 61,62 and 63 percent once more, just to make sure I'm not hallucinating or seeing things. But I'd like to see if you have a different theory first before I start all over again, if you don't mind.

[Pete-zza]

Mike,

I don't have another theory at this point. You have been playing around with a lot of moving parts and a lot of variables while trying to conduct multiple experiments at one time in a kitchen setting that is not particularly conducive to conducting scientific-type experiments. Also, as I have learned from experience, the more you try to do, the greater the likelihood of human error. I think I would repeat just the 63% experiment as closely as possible to what you did with your last 63% experiment. That means you should add the sugar to the preferment as you did before. You should also keep good notes on everything you do, especially quantities, temperatures, times, etc. That will allow us to focus our attentions on just that one experiment.

Peter

[csacks]

This is a pizza at 61% hydration.  Dakota Maid premium bread flour.  Started at mid morning on day one.  Broken into balls on day two.  Baked at 550o at noon on day three.  I brushed the crust with garlic oil before baking.  The pizza was taken from the oven after 6 minutes. 



Thanks Essen1 !

[Pete-zza]

Craig,

Very nice. Which dough recipe did you use?

Peter

[csacks]

Reply # 298

I forget how fast these posts can move. 

The crust stood up well.  No need for fork, you could pick it up.  Kinda a firm chew.  I don't think that I need to add VWG to this flour.

The cheese was cool.  It had been frozen.

[Essen1]

Mike,

I don't have another theory at this point. You have been playing around with a lot of moving parts and a lot of variables while trying to conduct multiple experiments at one time in a kitchen setting that is not particularly conducive to conducting scientific-type experiments. Also, as I have learned from experience, the more you try to do, the greater the likelihood of human error. I think I would repeat just the 63% experiment as closely as possible to what you did with your last 63% experiment. That means you should add the sugar to the preferment as you did before. You should also keep good notes on everything you do, especially quantities, temperatures, times, etc. That will allow us to focus our attentions on just that one experiment.

Peter

Peter,

Over the last day and a half I have revised my 63% formula and lowered the IDY amount down to .5%, dropped the salt value down to 1.5% but upped the sugar value to 2%, up from the previous 1.5%.

Here's the revised formula:

Flour (100%):    450.89 g  |  15.9 oz | 0.99 lbs   (440 g KABF / 11 VWG)
Water (63%):    284.06 g  |  10.02 oz | 0.63 lbs
IDY (.5%):    2.25 g | 0.08 oz | 0 lbs | 0.75 tsp | 0.25 tbsp
Salt (1.5%):    6.76 g | 0.24 oz | 0.01 lbs | 1.21 tsp | 0.4 tbsp
Oil (1%):            4.51 g | 0.16 oz | 0.01 lbs | 1 tsp | 0.33 tbsp
Sugar (2%):    9.02 g | 0.32 oz | 0.02 lbs | 2.26 tsp | 0.75 tbsp

Total (168%):   757.5 g | 26.72 oz | 1.67 lbs | TF = N/A

Single Ball:   378.75 g | 13.36 oz | 0.83 lbs

Beginning tonight, I'll give the classic poolish (100% hydration) a shot once again, without the addition of sugar, and see what the outcome is with the addition of VWG. I had good results before when you initially suggested your protocol for the poolish. So let's see what happens tomorrow night when the pies hit the stone.