Caputo Flour (red bag)
I finally managed to find some caputo flour in New York. It took nearly 4 months to find a distributor and had to drive to the Bronx to pick it up from a warehouse. I'm not sure why it was so difficult to find in a pizza haven, I must have missed something. Anyways...
I'm writing to review the flour.
Being that it is 00 it is clearly finer thatn KABF. I usually use sir gallahad. It barely coats your finger tips and absorbs moisture really well. So well that I had to drop my usual hydration percentage from 72 percent to 58 percent. I made several boules around 63-65 percent. The dough was super lax. It shaped really well and held the boule for the first hour during a cold ferment. After that first hour it turned to mush. Shaping was difficult. The dough was super stretchy and wanted to tear. It really needs hydration below 60 percent. I'm going to make another batch tomorrow and let it cold ferment till wednesday.
As far as the flavor, it was really incredible. I made the dough in the morning. Had a six hour cold ferment and baked it for dinner. I baekd it around 625F with my stone on the top shelf of the oven. The flavor was better than any KABF pie I've made, including the ones with preferments. The crust was chewy but not overly so. Really great flour. Play with the hydration.