Homemade Pizza

[Mendes]

18 hours ago, MrBurns84 said:

I'd have to say that the double fermentation and poolish method (from Vito) made the best dough to date for me.  Takes time to do but well worth it at the end.   

Here is the condensed recipe from Vito’s Utube channel , a bit of trial and error.

I note the times to see if it changes he end result.

Make sure you put olive oil on hands before you start kneading, it’s very sticky dough once combined with the poolish starter .......

enjoy

[ArthurDent]

Ham, prawns, mushrooms, capsicum, olives (not Kalamata, must have run out), pineapple and cheese on tomato base. Basic one hour one prove dough. ILVE 900mm fan forced electric oven.

 

Edited October 3, 2021 by ArthurDent

[Martykt]

[Mendes]

Using the recipe from above I get 6 @“~ 285g balls.

We made 3 pizzas and froze the other 3.

Had a mate over and got him on the tools, he had a ball and pizzas were very good. My best dough to date.... getting better each time.

 

 

[Martykt]

[Demondes]

On 29/09/2021 at 10:13 AM, Esoterica said:

You can build one easy mate. All you need is around 30 (approx. 200 x 100mm) bricks or pavers and two large pavers (450mm square or larger).

 

You can use a regular oven, but will want a pizza stone OR steel. You need something that will hold the heat to make a crisp base. An oven like the one I built, or a proper one is better though, as higher heat (than a standard oven can produce) is ideal.

 

You only need basic plain flour, and can use part wholemeal if you want. You can also do sourdough, but that's a whole other level of commitment. I haven't used "proper" bread & pizza flour yet, as I had some opened bags of the cheap stuff, and they were fine, especially the neapolitan style (the flavour is in the fermentation). I bought expensive Lighthouse brand bread & pizza flour, so will see if that's any better next time I make some.

 

As for making a thick base, it should just come down to not making it too thin when you roll it out. The first one I made with the basic dough recipe had a thick base, because I wasn't good at it.

 

These are the recipes I used. Both are dead easy, just need to plan and be patient. 
 

Neapolitan slow-rise - https://www.thursdaynightpizza.com/neapolitan-pizza-dough/
 

Basic quick-rise - https://www.thursdaynightpizza.com/1-hour-pizza-dough/

 

And here's the video I based my oven on...

 

 

 

I like the simplicity of the oven but be burns the baes a bit too much for my liking.   Those horizontal slabs are those clay pavers or stone?  They do look a bit like concrete but that is probably just the colour

[Esoterica]

38 minutes ago, Demondes said:

I like the simplicity of the oven but be burns the baes a bit too much for my liking.   Those horizontal slabs are those clay pavers or stone?  They do look a bit like concrete but that is probably just the colour

How charred it gets is purely up to how hot you make the fire. The ones I've baked so far have had very little of that. Kind of by accident really, as I usually don't have the fire cranking when I put the pizza in. If you do it'll cook in a few minutes. So you can do it super hot and quick like that, and probably get some burnt bits, or do it not quite as hot and you'll get a nice golden crust. Mine have cooked for around 6-8 minutes.

 

Do you mean the slabs in the video or what I used? If the latter, they're sold as pavers from bunnings. Iirc it was about $32 for both. The small pavers I had already. I considered the concrete (plain grey) that bunnings sell, but I think they cost more and I didn't like the idea of using them, as opposed to what I ended up buying. As it turned out, they've done the job well so far.
 

 

Edited October 4, 2021 by Esoterica

[Esoterica]

I was looking forward to some Vito's poolish style pizza tonight. That was until I watched the second half of his video and discovered that there is another 2.5 hours proofing to go. Should've realise tbh. It's going to be ready at 9:30. Oh well will freeze most. I knew by the quantities in his recipe that it was a lot of dough, but when you actually make it... phwoar, it's a basketball sized dough ball

 

Something exciting in the making process, when I put the poolish into the water for final mix, it was stringy like mozzarella. Didn't see that in the video

[Mendes]

3 hours ago, Esoterica said:

I was looking forward to some Vito's poolish style pizza tonight. That was until I watched the second half of his video and discovered that there is another 2.5 hours proofing to go. Should've realise tbh. It's going to be ready at 9:30. Oh well will freeze most. I knew by the quantities in his recipe that it was a lot of dough, but when you actually make it... phwoar, it's a basketball sized dough ball

 

Something exciting in the making process, when I put the poolish into the water for final mix, it was stringy like mozzarella. Didn't see that in the video

Ha ha, and sticky hands.....

[Esoterica]

Yeahhhh boyeee, pizza sorted for weeks

 

This is after proofing for the last time..

 

 

[Mendes]

1 hour ago, Esoterica said:

Yeahhhh boyeee, pizza sorted for weeks

 

This is after proofing for the last time..

 

 

The dough balls freeze really good, I am trying to build up some stock for when you just feel like a pizza but cannot wait the 2 days .....

[Mendes]

Just now, Mendes said:

The dough balls freeze really good, I am trying to build up some stock for when you just feel like a pizza but cannot wait the 2 days .....

 

[eso]

Love my portable pizza oven. Gozney Roccbox

[Esoterica]

22 hours ago, Mendes said:

The dough balls freeze really good, I am trying to build up some stock for when you just feel like a pizza but cannot wait the 2 days .....

I watched the video you posted to make sure to do it right. Never frozen dough.

 

It's not pizza, but baking. I baked a batch of choc chip cookies the other day. Not bad but can me a lot better. I had way more dough than expected (as I halved the recipe) but ended up cooking all of it. Freezing cookie dough is easy as though.

14 hours ago, eso said:

Love my portable pizza oven. Gozney Roccbox

That leopard crust is beautiful! Gonna google that oven!

[Esoterica]

Last night, I cooked a couple of pizzas from the Vito's poolish I made. The first (margherita) turned out ok, but the crust wasn't as airy and browned as I hoped. I didn't have the fire hot enough/preheated enough I think. 
 

The second pizza was half leftover roast chicken, bacon, mushrooms and red onion, half smoked beef brisket, bacon and red onion on bbq base.

 

 I had a nightmare with this one. Rolled it out too thin and had too much weight in toppings, so when I went to slide into the oven, the toppings slid, but pizza base didn't budge

 

Cut to a bunch of cheese and toppings sizzling on the stone and me scrambling to get as much off it off, as possible. I realised there was no way I was going to get the pizza into the oven, so cooked it on the peel. It worked out alright, just had a mostly burnt base. I wouldn't do leftover cooked meat again though. The brisket wasn't too bad, but the chicken was dry/powdery yuck.

 

 

 

 

[Mendes]

40 minutes ago, Esoterica said:

 I had a nightmare with this one. Rolled it out too thin

A suggestion, never roll always stretch, When you roll you squish and lose all the air that makes a big bubbly crust.

I rolled for some time also before I realized why so important to stretch....hope this helps.... 

[Esoterica]

31 minutes ago, Mendes said:

A suggestion, never roll always stretch, When you roll you squish and lose all the air that makes a big bubbly crust.

I rolled for some time also before I realized why so important to stretch....hope this helps.... 

I didn't "roll" roll it haha. I did stretch, just couldn't think of the term. I've never actually used a roller. It only took me a couple of times to get the hang of stretching. I did exactly as Vito advises. Start by pressing into a round, and to form a crust, then roll it over your hands/thumbs. It doesn't take much for it to stretch too thin using taht method though. 

[Mendes]

9 minutes ago, Esoterica said:

I didn't "roll" roll it haha. I did stretch, just couldn't think of the term. I've never actually used a roller. It only took me a couple of times to get the hang of stretching. I did exactly as Vito advises. Start by pressing into a round, and to form a crust, then roll it over your hands/thumbs. It doesn't take much for it to stretch too thin using taht method though. 

Vito "is" the pizza guy......

[Martykt]

6 hours ago, Esoterica said:

I didn't "roll" roll it haha. I did stretch, just couldn't think of the term. I've never actually used a roller. It only took me a couple of times to get the hang of stretching. I did exactly as Vito advises. Start by pressing into a round, and to form a crust, then roll it over your hands/thumbs. It doesn't take much for it to stretch too thin using taht method though. 

That side of it does take practice.  

I'm lucky in that I used to work in a pizza shop when I was young (aussie thick base style not wood fired) so have an advantage with the dough side of things.

 

Due to the aeration of this particular dough the dough balls are a lot bigger than you'd expect.

The dough over hand method is almost overkill for this dough and the finger spread method is almost all that is required with only very delicate over hand.

 

The flour is also very important to get it to slide off the pizza spatula.

Vito uses a perforated pizza spatula which probably helps too and while he makes it look easy the technique for getting the pizza off the spatula into the oven takes practice too.

 

Another thing that Vito actually missed was what temperature to get your pizza oven too (he did mention home oven temp).

I know my brother found about 350 degrees works well for him.

@Mendes, what temperature have you found works well with this particular dough?

Edited October 8, 2021 by Martykt

[Monty]

Enjoying the thread everyone. Friday is pizza night here. Occasionally I try to cook something else instead only to be confronted by kids' outrage. This thread has inspired me to take a bit more time and care over them than I sometimes do. Here's three of the five. The house pizza is ham, capsicum, olives and half and half pineapple. I had some caramelised onion left over from last night's bbq, so I finished with a bianco - onion, mushroom and blue cheese - to keep the greedy kids at bay.

 

[Mendes]

1 hour ago, Martykt said:

That side of it does take practice.  

I'm lucky in that I used to work in a pizza shop when I was young (aussie thick base style not wood fired) so have an advantage with the dough side of things.

 

Due to the aeration of this particular dough the dough balls are a lot bigger than you'd expect.

The dough over hand method is almost overkill for this dough and the finger spread method is almost all that is required with only very delicate over hand.

 

The flour is also very important to get it to slide off the pizza spatula.

Vito uses a perforated pizza spatula which probably helps too and while he makes it look easy the technique for getting the pizza off the spatula into the oven takes practice too.

 

Another thing that Vito actually missed was what temperature to get your pizza oven too (he did mention home oven temp).

I know my brother found about 350 degrees works well for him.

@Mendes, what temperature have you found works well with this particular dough?

Hi Marty,

 

I use Caputo and have had oven at around 430 C .... 60 to 90 seconds and its done

 

[eso]

53 minutes ago, Mendes said:

Hi Marty,

 

I use Caputo and have had oven at around 430 C .... 60 to 90 seconds and its done

 

Thats my go to as well. For neapolitan style pizza

[eso]

I found Ken Forkish book, “the elements of pizza” a great help

[GregWormald]

When I was visiting in the Naples area I noticed that all the locals eat their pizza with a knife and fork as the thin crust won't support the toppings.

 

That's fine with me as I usually like more topping and less crust. I'm just waiting for the Ooni to arrive (next week!) to see if my preferences change.

[bob_m_54]

14 hours ago, GregWormald said:

When I was visiting in the Naples area I noticed that all the locals eat their pizza with a knife and fork as the thin crust won't support the toppings.

 

That's fine with me as I usually like more topping and less crust. I'm just waiting for the Ooni to arrive (next week!) to see if my preferences change.

I'm the opposite. My wife used to stack the topping on, but I found the pizza can become too soggy. The bottom layers of topping can be 'stewed' rather than roasted.. Less is more for me..