Pizza Margherita with mushrooms

Pizza with Mushroom and Leek

Pizza with Mushroom and Leek Slice

 I want to make really good pizza crust. So, this is a first step on a journey. I've read lots of recipes, but I have a lot to learn and a long way to go. 

I made the dough yesterday. I basically followed the recipe in Reinhart's BBS, except I didn't. I autolysed the dough for 15 minutes before adding the yeast and salt. I used KAF's Perfect Pizza flour, which is a blend that includes some semolina. After kneading, I refrigerated the dough overnight.

 I stretched the dough by hand (no rolling) quite thin. I've made pizza 3 or 4 times before, and this was the nicest handling pizza dough ever. I was able to get it to window pane over the whole surface (if I'd wanted to). 

 After topping the pizzas, I baked immediately at 500F with convection on a pre-heated stone. I baked the mushroom-leek pizza bianco for 6-3/4 minutes. The margherita baked for 8 minutes.

 I think they look pretty good, but the bottom crust was not crisp enough for me, and the outside crust was too chewy.

 *sigh*

I think I need to try other flours. Maybe I over-stretched the dough. Maybe ... Maybe.

I wish I had a real pizza oven!

Any suggestions from ace pizza makers would be appreciated.

David 

Great pic of my Pizza Margherita, I don't use recipes so this was a dough made with 25% farina. Was very delicious!

Last night, I made some homemade pizza using a Weber gas grill, too hot to use the oven in the house. I cobbled together a French bread recipe from Uncle John's Bread Book (the crusty french bread recipe on p.112 if you have the book), a You Tube video about putting the pan higher up in the gas grill and some advice here.

I made the French bread recipe (although halving it) followed the rising times (used the French Fold, too), and put the dough in a rectangular pan sprayed with Pam to keep from sticking. The pan was placed on four tin cans placed on the grate and I turned up three burners to get a heat reading around 550 degrees.

It cooked for about 15 minutes when it looked brownish and pulling away from the pan. I then put the toppings on and cooked about another 10 minutes. It came out really nicely except the bottom was burnt black in the middle but not on the ends.

So why the burning? Was it the Pam spray? A little too hot? Too much time on the first bake through before adding the toppings?

As I recall, the recipe was 3 cups AP flour, one packet yeast proofed in warm water with sugar and a bit of salt, 2 hour rise, shaping, one-hour rise, baking. It tasted fine; I just wanted to get rid of the black burnt on the bottom.

Thanks for any help

Neal Lavon
Takoma Park, MD
USA

I posted some time ago about trying to find high gluten flour for baking.

I finally found some in the Washington, D.C. area where I live--Costco sells Kyrol flour in 25 pound sacks but a local Amish market sells what it calls "Kyrol Flour" in 7.5 pound bags which is much more reasonable in my household.

I googled "Kyrol flour" and it seemed to be the high gluten flour that is on sale in 25-pound quantities. At any rate, I want to use it in a basic pizza recipe; what accommodations need to be made for using high gluten flour instead of all purpose in a pizza recipe?

Thanks for any help.

Neal Lavon
Takoma Park, MD
USA

Hey everyone,

I'm looking for a good pizza pan for deep dish. I'm not sure about size so let me know anything. I've tried to find a cast iron for their wonderful radiance of heat but those do not seem to be available. The next best guess I have is one of the heavy 16-gauge alluminum pans. Let me know what has worked for you, brands, and places to buy from. Thank you very much!

Doughboy

I grew up in the chicago area, and a staple in college was the deep dish stuffed pizza. Now I live elsewhere, and it's harder to find. Plus, the whole challenge of making your own is hard to resist. I've been happy enough with varios thin crust pizzas, but the other day on a whim searched on recipezaar for the ubiquitous stuffed pizza.... and I found it!

http://www.recipezaar.com/88044

The main thing I didn't know was the order of ingredients and crust. Here it was---crust, fillings (cheese plus "toppings") followed by another crust, and topped with the sauce. It really works. Since then I've played around with crusts. I've been happiest so far with the BBA pizza napolean crust, which is thin and stretchy. I use a bit of WW flour for flavor/color/nutrition. I've found about 10-11 ounces for the bottom crust, and 5-6 for the top is about right. I'm using my cast iron skillet for the pan, which is a little smaller than the original recipe calls for, but works just great. I'm lucky to still have homemade home grown sauce from last summer, which helps a lot :)

I've been debating whether to prick the top crust or not--tonight I didn't and got a BIG bubble, so I think I'd recommend it.  This week was just pepperoni/mushroom, but I can vouch for the spinach as well--it's very good and seemed to make for a fuller filling after baking.  Tonight's was a bit thinner but tasty anyway...

Yesterday's dinner!

I used Pain la Ancienne formula for the dough ( a simple overnight retarded flour, water, yeast, salt dough), baked in a 550F oven for 8-9 minutes on tiles.

A 'Mikey special', this one is ( in order of construction), crushed tomatoes, italian spices, fresh garlic, mozarella cheese, gorgonzola cheese, feta cheese, 3 types of olives ( oil cured, green, and black), mushrooms, red onions, and some more mozzarella to hold it all together. This was great, sometimes my specials are a bit wet and thick but this one came out just perfect since I used a restraint with the amount of each ingredient for a change.

Cheese

Nothing special here, just crushed tomatoes, italian spices, garlic powder, mozzarella, romano, parmesan. So good though :-)

Mike in New Jersey

I used the basic no-knead recipe from www.artisanbreadinfive.com for the crust, and topped it with caramelized onions and mushrooms.