Yongala Pub Fat Aussie Pizza

[wotavidone]

I enjoyed the vegetarian pizza at the Globe Hotel in Yongala, South Australia so much that I am going to do two things.

1) Do my best to spread the word to potential visitors that, if they can just get themselves out of Sydney, there is a whole world of Outback Aussie Pubs that will absolutely delight them. I'll name four or five, just to get 'em started:

• Halfway Hotel, Oodla Wirra, South Australia. You could do a lot worse than have a beer and a feed at the Oodly.
• Silverton Hotel, NSW. It still has a car or two from the Mad Max movies hanging around. Mad Max was filmed in the area
• Globe Hotel Yongala South Australia. Great food, great beer garden, it very occasionally snows in winter believe it or not,
• Prairie Hotel, Parachilna, South Australia. It closes over summer, but its the place to be if you want to try alternative meats. The Feral Mixed Grill has kangaroo, emu, and camel in  it.
• Mungerannie Pub, Lot 10 Birdsville Track, South Australia

[wotavidone]

2) I'm going to attempt to reproduce Darryl's Fat Aussie Pub Pizzas at home.
This is a challenge, I've been a NP devotee for many years.

I started by making some high protein dough.

1 kg generic flour, with protein boosted to 12.5% from 10%
620g water
4 tsp salt
1 tsp IDY
dash (20 mls?) Olive oil.

By the time I finished, I had 1.7 kg/3.74 lbs of dough going in the wife's twin spiral mixer.

I love this thing - counter rotating dough hooks and a 2 speed motor driven mixing bowl.
She says I gave it to her as a present at least 12 years ago.
What stresses me is that, if I break it,  like all good appliances they don't make 'em anymore.
Despite many hours of research I have not found the same thing.
(Twin counter-rotating dough hooks, rotating bowl, 2 kg dough capacity.)

[wotavidone]

So I tried to make Fat Aussies.
Learned a bit.
1st one looked OK coming out of the oven but I wasn't all that happy with it. OK in its own right, but not really a Fat Aussie.

290g dough for a 12 inch pizza.
Sauce was pulped tomato with a clove of garlic, a dollop of sweet chilli sauce, some basil leaves and a sprinkle of rock salt.
Red and Green capsicum, sliced onion, sliced tomato, diced asparugus, diced pineapple.
Cheese went on top, rather than underneath the other toppings Like I normally do.
Cooked for about 4 minutes in the wood oven. That was trick #1 I had to learn - cooling the oven is not easy after years of going for as much heat I could get.

[wotavidone]

Second veggie pizza was better.
For starters I remembered the rest of the toppings. 

290g Doughball
Same tomato sauce
Red and green capsicum, sliced onions, green olives (found some green Jumbo Kalamatas my neighbour gave me years ago.)
Diced pineapple, sliced sweet gherkins, diced asparagus spears, sliced tomato, a little extra salt, lots of cheese
Better.
Still didn't get the crust thick enough.
With all the pizzas, I tried a trick that I think I read in a Dough Doctor post, I brushed the stretched skins with olive oil to stop the sauce making the dough soggy. It worked a little I think.
Ran the sauce right out to the edge, as this was a noticeable trait over at the pub.

[wotavidone]

Just met up with a South African friend for a couple of drinks at a local pub before he cruises off back to New Zealand for the Christmas break.
Turns out he was at the same pub yesterday, watching them make pizzas on pre-made crusts from the Woolworths supermarket around the corner.
It was hilarious watching him demand an explanation from the manager. "What for you have a wood-fired oven and you get the pizza out of a plastic bag, eh?"
Priceless. Of course, I was anxiously searching the floor for a hole to disappear down.

[wotavidone]

Not wanting to hijack the thread about recreating Slab pizza, I figured I'd hijack an old thread of my own.
I, too, salivate every time I watch that video of those big pillow like slabs of gooey goodness.

I have the task of prparing the main meal every day while I'm on vacation/self isolation and the missus is working.
So yesterday, I watched that damned video again and got to hankering for big and greasy pizza - slow cooked (relative to the wood oven) in a pan.
Then I was poking around in the oven and found this fairly heavy 10 x 15 x 1.25 steel pan the missus bought on sale.

So I made a dough that I must write down now before I forget.

600g of all purpose plain flour.
380g water = 63% hydration.
15g salt ~ 2.5%
1/4 tsp dry yeast no idea what that weighs
2 tsp sugar
1/4 of a US cup of oil - 55 mls?

Mix in the twin spiral mixmaster for what seems like forever, but was in fact probably no more than 20 minutes from adding the water to getting a doughball that was trying to stall the machine.
Turn out into an oiled bowl, shape it and leave on the bench to rise.
Check three ours later and wonder whether you forgot the yeast.
Leave it on the bench and cook bacon and eggs for tea.

Rise at midnight for a toilet break and find the dough trying to climb out of the bowl. Knock it down, hit the head and go back to bed.
Get up in the morning and do it again.

About 4 pm stretch it out into the oiled pan.
Lightly oil the top of the dough.
Top with the amount of toppings normally put on three wood oven pizzas.

1/2 can (200g) diced Italian tomatoes, 200g of wet mozzarella, cover half in hot sopressa, the other half in mild.  Grate about 50g red leceister chedder over the top and add a few dollops of tomato on top.

Oven pre-heating to 500F (high as she'll go) now.
Here's hoping.

[wotavidone]

It cooked alright. 20 minutes at 500F saw it browned and sizzling.
And it did that little jiggly thing as it landed on the table.
Would probably do 22-25 minutes next time - and the missus assures me there will be a next time.
I wish I could take better photographs, here is the best I could do.

[wotavidone]

So, I always thought Aussies were the Kings of Fat Pizza.
I mean, we even have a TV show called Fat Pizza.
But today, I came across this. This guy John Kirkwood posted a crusty bread roll video that got us out of trouble one Christmas Day when we forgot to buy the dinner rolls.
He's a retired English cook who posts quite a few how-to videos.
In this video, he puts on about 4 times as much cheese (nearly a full pound on a 12 incher) as I put on most of mine, stuffs the crust and loads this thing up to the max.
He comments several times he only makes it every 6 weeks.

[02ebz06]

I'd call that a thin crust deep dish pizza.

[wotavidone]

I'd call that a thin crust deep dish pizza.

It sure is a heart attack special.