Norma,
As the famous Scottish poet Robert Burns once wrote:
The best-laid schemes o' mice an' men
Gang aft agley,
And lea'e us nought but grief an' pain
I'm sure that you and your daughter had everything planned out such that you would have complete control of the situation. But, alas, it appears that your plans went astray when your pizza was made in a way that you did not anticipate. If I had to guess, your pizza may have been par-baked. You might recall that a couple of times in this thread it was mentioned that Mack's would partially bake certain pizzas and add the toppings (e.g., pepperoni) later and finish the bake. That may have been the fate of your pizza but without the toppings.
I might add that the bottom crust seemed quite a bit darker than some of the other Mack's pizzas we have seen. And, to be honest, I think your Mack's clones look better than the one you purchased.
If we take the weights you got on your scale and do a few conversions, the range was 2.22 pounds to 2.14 pounds, or 35.52 ounces to 34.24 ounces. You might recall that the weight of the baked Mack's cheese pizza that Pied Piper purchased was 34.78 ounces. My speculation is that that was the weight of the pizza after it had cooled for a while before weighing but it does fall within the weight range of the latest Mack's pizza. For comparison purposes, my recollection from Reply 1420 at http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,9068.msg209979.html#msg209979 is that your last Mack's clone cheese pizza weighed 2.126 pounds, or 34.02 ounces, after baking (the prebaked weight was 38.5 ounces). Of course, we still don't know what the starting (unbaked) weight of a Mack's 18" cheese pizza is. But at least we are in the ballpark in my opinion, at least with respect to the baked weight. We may also be wrong about the par-baking and what effect it might have had on the final weight after cooling. We just don't know what really happened. But I wouldn't get too upset about what happened. There will always be another time, or perhaps another member will be kind enough to buy an 18" cheese pizza from Mack's and weigh it for us. Maybe we also need to start a Help Norma fund to reimburse you for all the money you have put out to date for cheeses and flours and Mack's pizzas in your efforts to clone the Mack's pizza. In fact, if you ever nail the recipe and everything else, you might keep it a secret and sell it in a secure way on eBay for a lofty sum. Of course, I will also want a royalty for each copy of the recipe sold 
.
You did not say, but how did the Mack's pizza taste?
Peter
Peter,
I never heard the quote from the famous Scottish poet Robert Burns, but that fits to the T what happened yesterday.
I thought I had every thing planned out, but it didn’t turn out that way. I think if I would have purchased a pizza earlier in the day, things might have been different. Until we left Wildwood to go to Cape May and then went back to Wildwood again, the people had really thinned out and many of the shops were closing.
Thanks for posting you thought the pizza was par-baked. I do recall on this thread that a couple of times it was mentioned that Mack’s would partially bake certain pizzas and then add the toppings, before the final bake. I also recall that other pizza that I purchased that was par-baked. That pizza was supposed to be for measuring weights too. That was the pizza that I thought should have been thrown under the boardwalk.
Things happened so fast when my daughter and I were inside Mack’s, that I didn’t have time to fully comprehend what was going on. Since no one else was purchasing any pizzas, I couldn’t watch what had happened with my pizza. If there would have been other customers in Mack’s, I would have watched more closely where those pizzas came from. But alas, that didn’t happen.
Good to hear since your calculations that the Mack’s pizza still falls within the ballpark ranges of our Mack’s pizzas. Thanks for doing the calculations.
The bottom crust was a lot darker on the Mack’s pizza I purchased, but it didn’t taste burnt. I froze a slice for Steve to taste tomorrow.
Lol, the idea if there really is a real Mack’s clone about keeping it secret and selling the recipe on eBay.
Of course I would give you a royalty for each copy of the recipe sold.
You have also invested a lot of time on this thread.
As for the Help Norma fund to reimburse me for the money to date on the cheeses and flours, that isn’t needed. I do really want to be able to make a decent Mack’s clone for myself and other members.
The pizza did taste good, except for the crust. As can be seen the crust was way too dry and crackery. The crust didn’t have any flavor and no oven spring. After picking one slice apart the sauce looked very sparse to me too.
I am not going to make a Mack’s attempt this week, but might next week.
At least I picked-up some of those diamonds on Sunset Beach in Cape May.
http://www.njsouth.com/Sunsetbeach.htm Maybe they will help me pay for future expenses.
Norma
