/ck/ - Food & Cooking

[Anonymous No.15418599]

Rate my pizza lads. 3 day cold ferment for the dough using Strong White Bread Flour. Dry yeast activated before hand with sugar and warm water.
Cheese is a wet mozzarella and cheddar mix. I squeezed the moz as dry as possible and used the cheddar for extra flavour and the crispy finish you can see. I used a small amount so it didn't get greasy and soggy.
Sauce is San Marzano tomatoes with salt and some ground pepper which brings out earthy flavours.
Cooked at about 200c for 10 minutes.

[Anonymous No.15418616]

Looks Duane's house or Sammy's

[Anonymous No.15418679]

>>15418616
I'm in GB but yeah, does. Proper tasty tbqh and easy to make. Spent weeks trying to get a decent pizza going and I've done it. Here's the one I made for my parents.

[Anonymous No.15419064]

>>15418599
https://voca.ro/1bQlLj2iZSEw

[Anonymous No.15419092]

Would eat but the dough doesn't looks like it had been fermented 3 days. Either the yeast was dead, your oven wasn't hot enough, you didn't kneat enough, the dough was low hydration or something else. There should be visible bubbles on the dough and crust.

[Anonymous No.15419119]

Looks good OP. I prefer the second one since it has a bit more browning on the crust. I also made some pizzas using a stone for the first time. First two came oval shaped because I wasn't that good with the peel.

[Anonymous No.15419135]

>>15419064
Cheers lad, yeah I think I'll pass on your tendies tbqh.
But yeah, bubbles are superior. Rolling pin mongs basically waste 3 days of fermentation by rolling out all the air which is retarded. Dough I agree with. Needed to really make it much thinner but didn't want to get rid of my air. But that's technique, I've done research into that and need to practice new methods of stretch.
>>15419092
Yeah it's just oven so not as hot as it could be. Generally from what I've seen, it's really not possible to get big airy crust from the standard oven. Mine cost like 150 quid, 170 dollars second hand so it's shit. Was approx 65% hydration I think.
Have used a stone that's heated for 1 hour in the oven but I prefer the tray because it adds more crisp and texture.
Otherwise I was quite happy. Sauce needs a lot more flavour so I'm growing basil and oregano to try out different combinations.

>>15419119
Looks nice. What cheese are you using? Is that grease from the pepperoni?
I've used stones but I'm not a fan, at least for that dough. It doesn't add enough crisp or texture. The second one I actually didn't like too much. Partially my mistake with overflow onto the crust but the toppings added a lot more moisture which made it soggy. You can see that on parts of the crust too.

[Anonymous No.15419137]

>>15419119
They had a nice crumb though, and it came out a bit crunchy which I like. I just used AP flour with 12 g of protein. Just added water, salt, yeast and covered with olive oil while fermenting.

[Anonymous No.15419148]

>>15419092
thats the style. like a crispy pita. gluten frees not too bad. some remind me of cookies.

[Anonymous No.15419154]

200c is a bit low for a pizza, you cant do 250?

[Anonymous No.15419174]

>>15419135
If your oven has a broiler/grilling function place directly under broiler. Look for a way the broiler/heating element stays on, mine stays on when I keep the oven door slightly open.

Just saying it could damage your oven as it will exceed temperatures on the oven dial.

[Anonymous No.15419176]

>>15419135
>What cheese are you using?
Low moisture mozzarella with a little bit of parmesan on top. And yeah, the pepperoni made it much more greasy, but there's also some grease from the cheese. Here's one with ham and pineapple which didn't come as greasy.

[Anonymous No.15419192]

>>15419137
How long did you ferment? What temps? Cold ferment? That looks really good and crisped really well. Does oily cheese/toppings help keep the centre from over cooking?

[Anonymous No.15419210]

>>15419154
>>15419174
Yeah the temps are an issue because the oven is cheap shit and door doesn't fully close so leaks heat. Would want more temps, 250c as you say would be ideal. Looking into pizza ovens but don't have the money right now.
>>15419176
Looks good. You pepperoni pizza crust is my goal tbqh. The low moisture mozerella I find a little tasteless so use rich wet mozzarella but try and drain as much fluid before hand. Might try again with low moisture and cheddar.

[Anonymous No.15419284]

>>15419192
I fermented in bulk overnight for about 10-11 hours, divided and shaped the dough into balls and let them proof at room temperature for at least 45 minutes. I only used 2% yeast (no preferments, and at room temperature), or 1/2 a tsp for a kilogram of flour. Of course, by the time I made the last pizza it came out really thicc on the crust because I left it proofing more time, about 90 minutes. My oven also goes to about 250 degrees Celsius so that's a factor as well.

[Anonymous No.15419318]

>>15418599
Get a pizza steel, you'll love it, it's the last missing piece. You obviously payed enough attention to make the dough and ferment ahead of time, chances are good you're measuring by weight and not volume, probably have a good baker's percentage. You can tell in this pic that the crust isn't being all it could be. 200c isn't hot enough. I guarantee in spite of your 3 days of patience on a cold rise, the dough was more dense and tough than it should have been. You're so close to getting it exactly right and never needing to order from a pizzaria ever again. Steel > stone. Get a proper one and a pizza peel, let us know how it turns out but I guarantee you'll love it.

[Anonymous No.15419320]

>>15419284
>I only used 2% yeast
Woops, meant 0.2%, which is 2 grams of instant dried yeast, lmao.
>>15419210
I like the flavor of the low moisture, but I haven't experimented with other cheeses besides parmesan. I didn't do it with these pizzas, but roasting the veggies beforehand helps reduce moisture as well, so your pizza will be crispier at the bottom.

[Anonymous No.15419359]

>>15419284
Corr, looks great. How did you stretch it out? With hands I assume. That crispy finish due to the oil on the dough or did you put something in the dough?
>>15419318
Yeah, I've got a steel. What I baked it on. Has holes for whatever reason but it baked better than the stone. I measured the dough balls up by eye, think it's fine but probably needed it a little thinner. Heat is an issue, but I'm looking into other options to fix that.
Is heat all I can do for a crispy crust like >>15419284? I like my toppings and the way the cheese cooked but want that crispy outside with fluffy crust. Maybe brush on olive oil before baking?
>>15419320
Good point actually, maybe grill the veg to reduce a little moisture. Peppers are great and give a nice sweet but fresh flavour but yeah, the moisture isn't ideal. I rarely cook pizza with veg for myself anyway, love the simplicity of a pizza and want to get all 3 flavours bang on. Then I'd get bored and want to add more.

[Anonymous No.15419422]

>>15419359
Yeah, stretched by hand, and aside from the little bit of oil I added while fermenting, I didn't put anything.
I think you meant you used a pizza screen, not a steel. A pizza steel is much thicker, like a stone, and doesn't have any holes.
For the crispy bottom, yes, you need more heat in my opinion, so a stone or steel is recommended. If you want a fluffier crust you may want to use a wetter dough. I used 70% hydration for my dough.

[Anonymous No.15419432]

>>15419359
If you were using a steel and got that result I'd suggest trying a different configuration or method with it. Most of them recommend that you put it on the highest or 2nd highest oven position and then to pre-heat and cook with your broiler/grill rather than the normal oven settings. 200c isn't a high enough temperature, you need more like 260+, which is what most broilers/grills run at. You should also be pre-heating your steel for a minimum 30 minutes, maybe 45 depending on how well it pre-heats. You want it to get as hot as possible before you slide a pizza onto it, I can tell just looking at the crust as someone who has made a shitload of pizza both at home and in a pizza shop that the crust was not cooked quickly enough at a high enough temperature.

The whole point of fermenting for 3 days is to create that gluten structure and create lots of air bubbles with the CO2 let out via the yeast metabolizing the protein and sugars. The purpose of the air bubbles and gluten structure is to make something which is elastic enough to easily stretch out, but which maintains that web-like pattern. When the raw dough hits an extremely hot surface, the cooking process starts quickly. Imagine taking a pan, putting it on a burner, setting it to maximum, and then 1 minute later splashing some water in there. The water would just pour into the pan and begin heating along with the pan because it didn't get hot enough. Now imagine that instead, you waited 5 minutes until the pan was searing hot and splashed the water in there. It would immediately sizzle like fucking crazy and evaporate. Your baker's percentage is ideally 60-65% water. When you place that raw dough in, it should pop/puff up and do it quickly. Those CO2 air chambers should fill and rise - less drastically where you flattened in the middle, more drastically where you didn't at the ends for the crust. I can just tell at a glimpse that it's like 80% there but not quite right.

[Anonymous No.15419434]

>>15419422
Okay, I'll add some hydration to them. Might whack out that stone and try and increase heat somehow. Maybe sit and hold the oven door shut lol.
Cheers lad will get onto it.

[Anonymous No.15419446]

>>15419432
Corr some solid information there. Again, I'm going to increase temp somehow. Oven is a heap of shit lol. Maybe I'll try again with my stone to see if I can get extra heat. Usually if I use my stone it's preheated for 1 hour. I think using a peel could help retaining heat too. Just bang it in instead of taking the stone out and shifting the pizza on.

[Anonymous No.15419492]

>>15419446

Right, and I'm with >>15419422 I think you might not know what we meant by pizza steel, sounds like you maybe described a metal pan, but that's not what a steel is. Go on google amazon and type in "pizza steel", you will see a bunch of 1/4 inch thick steel plates.

So again, thought exercise:

Let's say it's hot as fuck outside and you walk up to your car with a black paint job that's been parked directly in the sun for hours. If you hover your hand a few inches above the paint without touching it, you might feel some heat, but nothing too bad. Slam your hand down on the car's surface and leave it there and you might burn the fucking shit out of your hand. That's because (as we all learned in grade school science class) there are 3 ways to transfer heat: convection, conduction, and radiation.

Radiant heat is heat that is transferred via radiation to things in close proximity, like warming your hands next to a fire. Convection heat is the circulating of heat via the motion of particles through a medium (like circulating water or air). Conduction heat is what we want to cook our pizza crust. It's the transfer of heat directly from the burning hot surface of your car sitting in the sun to your relatively cool hand. It transfers MUCH more heat, and it transfers it MUCH faster. Since speed in heat transfer is the name of the game for getting a light and airy dough, the hotter the object (within reason) the faster the cook, the better the crisp/puff of the dough. That's the role a pizza steel (or stone) plays. Steel is far more conductive than stone, heats quicker, and retains that heat more efficiently. It's also obviously less brittle, which means it's superior in every way to stones for heating a pizza in your oven.

>why can't I use my thin metal pizza pan, preheat it in the oven, and cook on that?
It's thinness limits the heat it can retain and conduct to your pizza. That's why pizza steel - 1/4 inch thick or more.

[Anonymous No.15419514]

>>15419446
Ran out of characters in >>15419492

As you mentioned - using the peel and tossing that pizza in there is ideal. You don't want your stone or steel to cool AT ALL. The more it cools, the less energy it has that it can transfer to your pizza dough, meaning the slower it cooks your dough, the less crispy and fluffy/airy it becomes as a result. This is why many pizza restaurants use brick oven, wood or coal fired furnaces. The fire gets up to maybe 900 degress in some of those. The domed shape of the oven circulates the air to help bake the top of the pizza (combined with the radiation from the fire source as well as the top walls reflecting heat downward) while the floor of the oven is hot as shit. A neapolitan pizza in such an oven can cook in 2 minutes with a light, airy, fluffy dough and perfectly melted mozzarella on top. You can't achieve that in your home oven of course, but you can accomplish the next best thing. There's no reason why at ~250-260c you couldn't replicate a good NYC style pizza crust. The telltale sign of a well cooked crust is called "leoparding" or leopard spotting. It's when the dough looks like pic_related.jpg on the bottom (and top if it's neapolitan).

[Anonymous No.15419954]

>>15419064
based

[Anonymous No.15419964]

I just use my pita recipe these days. I can't eat huge amounts of pizza anymore.

[Anonymous No.15420263]

>>15418599
Looks good but where are the toppings

[Anonymous No.15420806]

>san memezano