The Roadside Pie King's blog

I already posted these creations to the C.B.  I feel these first specialty pizza pies of mine desire a blog entry also.

 This morning I whipped up a batch of my IDY pizza dough by hand, scaled for two 12- inch pies (324 Grams Ea.) The plan is for a seven-hour room temperature ferment. For these special Community bake pies, I am going way off the reservation in regards to toppings. My wife requested chicken as her topping, her pie will be chicken cordon blue pizza. My pie is going to be Italian eggplant Parmigiano pizza. Smile... This is exciting!

Preparation complete, oven pre-heating. All systems go

All the ingredients for both the chicken and eggplant pies ready and waiting. We are on schedule for a 4:30 PM bake. T minus 80 Minutes.  Smile...

First out of the oven, chicken cordon bleu.

Next up on the menu, Eggplant parmigiano pizza pie.

Thanks for visiting.

 My next community pie bake will be a sourdough skin, rustic pie from the country of my heritage, (Malta) Look for it in the C.B. thread!

 As promised, I submit for your approval:
 A  rustic flat bread pizza, from the island of Gozo Maltese/Gozitan Ftira/ Ftira Għawdxija. The toppings:
Olive oil, vine ripened tomato, anchovies, raw shallot rings, capers, sauteed shallots with shiitake mushrooms, garlic. and topped off with thinly sliced red potatoes. This my friends is indeed a culinary treat! The recipe is in the photos. I converted the crust (base) from a commercial yeast formula to sourdough, additionally I added my obligatory whole grains. As you can see this formula called for a very low hydration dough, which worked very well for this application.

Pizza Wednesday...05/22/19
Sourdough / 10% WHOLE GRAIN
N.Y. style: Sausage, pepperoni and peppers.
So it begins....80hrs. cold ferment, 11/2 hr. bench rest prior to stretch.

Sourdough crust, 10% Whole grain, (spelt & whole wheat.)

Fresh mozzarella, cooked crumbled hot Italian sausage, fire roasted red peppers and parmigiano reggiano.

I learned that I absolutely can bake an 18" pizza utilizing an 18" pizza screen. Since the screen keeps the pie rigid, it can be placed directly on an oven rack or on a smaller ( in my case 16") pizza steel. With this revelation, I have reached the size cutoff point for the confines of my home oven. My sourdough crust is working very nicely this particular pie is a 24hr cold ferment. The dough was easy to stretch into an 18" skin and was not overly extendable. 10% of whole grain gives great flavor and a nice bite. Very nontraditional for Brooklyn style, but the wife gives it high marks.

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Please don't count me as pretentious. I truly do not have delusions of grandeur. However, I have a lot of fun putting my limited knowledge and experience to the test. When I spend hours thinking about a bake before the spatula ever hits the flour, it is like a vacation for my anxious mind. Believe it or not, even writing a halfway intelligent blog entry helps my mild anxiety. Enough about me, this morning I saw a very nice looking Turmeric sourdough Bread, at one of the bread making clubs on FB. The poster did not link or post a recipe. That was enough to inspire, Turmeric sourdough Bread, test bake #1! I am always open to constructive criticism and helpful ideas, that could improve on my own ideas. To be continued:

Kind regards, Will F.

Busy night/morning.First, I am drying some of my sour culture for future generations to enjoy. Not quite dry yet coming along nicely. Next we have overnight batter, sourdough, 100% whole grain waffles. (Whole wheat, spelt and rye) with no added sugar. You can not buy these for any price! Light as air and the whole grains give a natural sweetness! Still to come sourdough English muffin dough is fermenting as we speak! Last but not least, the main attraction,Whole grain Oat porridge bread. The bread has been cold fermenting since 9PM last night, set for a 9PM bake tonight!     

On today's installment of cooking with Pop-Pop, we will take you through the steps for reviving Slo-Mo from his golden, albeit chilly refrigerated slumber, and prepare for a bake. For this exercise, we will need the following. 60 g of sleeping wild yeast @ 100% Hydration 1- 4 cup Pyrex glass storage container with a lid 1- 1/2 Pint Ball canning jar with a lid 1- slender mixing spoon 1- digital scale Bread flour UN-chlorinated Water. Step 1- Weigh 20g of the starter into the 1/2 pint jar (This will be your reserve.) Step 2- weigh the remaining 40g of starter into the 4 cup container (This is the "mother" for our dough build) For the next step, we will be mixing in equal parts of flour and water into our starter. The goal here is to keep the poolishes/ levain at 100% hydration. The simple equation to accomplish this is: Equal parts Flour + Water + Starter = 100% Hydration example: 20g Flour +20g Water + 20g Starter = 60g Starter at 100% hydration. Step 3 Using the formula above mix up your two batches of culture one to reserve for next time and one to be the mother of our bread. Be sure to mix the ingredients until all the flour is wet and the poolish looks smooth. Step 4 Cover and set both containers aside in a warm place (72-74F,) check in on the progress after about an hour or two. Step 4 Once you see signs of fermentation activity (bubbles on the surface and a sweet nutty aroma) you can put the 1/2 pint jar into the refrigerator. Allow the 120g of mother starter to continue to ferment until the next feeding (about 12 hours.) In actuality, I did not save enough starter on Thursday, leaving me with only 45g of mother to build on. Here is the 60g reserve just before it went back in the refrigerator. As you may have noticed this technique leaves us with no waste/discard to deal with; very clever indeed! To be continued.....

While we all love a nice crusty loaf of bread. Pillow soft buns with nary any crust at all have a place too.

Friday night dinner.
Mississippi chicken on fresh, home made pillow soft buns.

The Roadside Pie King

Please turn your attention to Hollands' North sea coast, Friesland, one of the Netherlands' northern provinces. Alongside world-famous Dutch cheeses like gouda and edam, there is the signature Frisian Gingerbread. This 100% "quick" rye bread, was often times steamed in a water bath rather than cooked in a dry oven. Here is my interpretation of

 Stanley Ginsberg's formula

Visit The Pie king at the link below for more information and photos.

Good Cooking for the Heart and Soul

Group Bake # 2 Spiced Honey Rye

Group Bake # 2 Spiced Honey Rye