FreeportBum said:
They look good. How long are you letting the stone heat up? I prefer to cook right on the stone. My oven goes to 550 but I preheat at 500 for about 1-1.5 hours before putting the pie on the stone. I do a half turn at about the 2.5 minute mark. and if you have never used it, try a little diastatic malt powder in your dough and see if you like the results.
I bought some malt, which I'll have for Round Three ...
I've been watching Italian Youtube videos at night while winding down for sleep ... even though I don't understand the words, I understand all of the gestures from being around Italian folks for all of my life, and obviously not understanding the audio channel makes it REALLY EASY to pay close attention to what they are doing on the bench!
I think last night's pizza would have come out closer to "right" if I'd gone straight onto the stone, like last time, but I didn't have confidence in the dough sliding off the peel and I didn't want to eat pizza with a lot of dry flour on the bottom this time.
It was an improvement, but there's still A LOT of room to get MUCH, MUCH better.
It WAS the beginning of handling the dough by hand, though, for me ...
Once I'm making pizzas by hand that are better than those from Danielle's rolling pin, she'll switch because she's competitive.
Cheers!
Essegi said:
Doesn't look bad! I just don't like burnt cheese, maybe it's still too hot above comparing to bottom, also some real mozz in slice would help. Stonw would be better.
If you are able correct temp are those: 430°C on bottom, 485°C on vault.
Btw here there is the disciplinary of Verace Pizza Napoletana, there's also in English:
http://www.pizzanapoletana.org/public/pdf/disciplinare%202008%20UK.pdf
good read!
Thanks for the info, I'm going to see this through.
I work primarily remotely (meaning, I'm working from home), and I want to be able to make pizzas when my boss comes to see me every couple of weeks ...
He's Italian, owned pizzerias before the granite shop, and his father still does own one here ...
Thanks for all the help so far ...
cypresshill1973 said:
grantmichaels... Very clever that accessory!
I am inspired to make an accessory for my smoker! So to cook pizzas with direct wood fire with more temps..
Time is my enemy, the thing I have the least of ...
I happen to do cad/cam work, and could have had this fabricated around the corner from my work.
I can tell you that the kettle pizza is nothing more than a cylinder of stainless (probably that 304 or whatever) with a window cut out of it.
There are nuts and washers that hold it's shape, and which also serve to hold the webber grates. The handles are just pieces of wood on metal rods so you can lift the apparatus on and off the bottom.
There's no catch, no tricks ... so you could easily recreate it.
Cheers!
PIC 1 said:
Look at that dough blow..............What a Gas !
Nice..
I use it....but not in pizza dough,..... French Baguettes and other long proofing doughs
Nice pies Grant...
Once you adapt to the new outdoor gear and find the recipe that suits your needs......stick with it
A couple of tips...
It's equally important to be precise on weighing out your ingredients as well as weighing out the dough ball each time.
I use screens, but never on the pizza stone. The stone or steel in meant to conduct the heat directly to the underside of the dough. By placing the screen on the stone you're adding a layer of convection into the process. Screens work best in the conventional oven.
Your Weber set-up is interesting, and the use of a good hardwood such as oak will really raise the heat. "00" flour is best choice for those high temps. A higher hydrated dough is what you want...It will be sticky, but that's what a little bench flour will straighten out.
You might get the best results with a smaller dough ball that's both stretched and tossed . Having a disc with almost a see through center thickness (windowpane) and a airy thicker rim is what you want to shoot for with the "00". A good two or three day dough rest in the fridge will ferment the dough and help prevent any tearing of the dough.
Less ingredients is best.....no need for a soggy crust. With the high temps that you're baking at, the thin crust pies should be done in under three minutes. Extra ingredients such as cured meats, hard grated cheeses and fresh herbs/ greens can easily be added after the bake.
Keep those disc's rolling !
Good tips here, thank you!
I was hoping you would visit because I definitely want to learn the different styles of pizza from different regions, Chicago being one of them, certainly.
This morning some Sclafani SM tomato base arrived, so I'll have that for Round Three ...
I've never baked in my life, so there's a lot of new territory to cover in learning this space for me (everything related to dough, really), but I live for challenges ...
I'm definitely going back to the stone next time ... and in fact, I ordered a perforated metal peel so that I could use a little bit more ample dough on the bench, and hopefully not have it make it to the stone ... we'll see ...
It's a much better scenario using the Weber than trying to get a stone up to temp indoors in Florida (heats up the whole house and wastes a ton of electricity on A/C) ... so, now I can figure it out ... it'll just take some fires ...
Thanks for helping, I'm sure I'll need more guidance!
I'm going to get this ...
