Passionate About Pizza: Making Great Homemade Pizza (11 page)

However, I generally do not recommend using tomato puree, tomato sauce, or tomato paste in your pizza sauce. These forms of tomatoes have been cooked and seasoned prior to canning and their tastes are frequently more compatible with pasta than pizza. There are exceptions to this, though. Some brands of crushed tomatoes come with tomato puree added; these work just fine. You will also note that my Mexican Chile Sauce uses canned tomato sauce.

Toppings

I believe that there is a little art in pizza making. As far as toppings go, this means achieving balance. In my opinion, great pizzas do not include an overabundance of toppings. Rather, they consist of a balance of the right amount of crust, sauce, cheese, spices, and toppings so that the whole taste is a blend of the components so the toppings do not overpower the sauce, cheese, and dough. However, my opinion does not really matter. Some people love sparse toppings while others love a ton of toppings swimming on their pizza. You should certainly choose what pleases your fancy.

Of course, everyone has his or her own idea of art. Well, express yourself! Feel free to use as many or as few toppings as you want. Adjusting the number or quantity of toppings is probably the easiest way to put your own stamp on someone else’s pizza recipe!

Yeast

Yeast is amazing stuff. It is a single-cell organism. It gives off carbon dioxide gas and alcohol as it multiplies. When allowed to grow inside dough that has gluten in it (as most bread dough does), the gas is trapped in the gluten and the dough “rises.” Yeast exists in many different strains. Some are wild and others are cultivated for specific purposes and sold commercially. Brewer’s yeast and baker’s yeast are two such strains. Sourdough starters capture and cultivate wild yeast. I guess that is enough of a science lesson!

Commercial Baker’s Yeast

Generally, you will use commercially available baker’s yeast in your baking. You can use whatever brand yeast you find locally. You can use active dry, instant, or quick-rise powdered yeast or fresh cake yeast. You should use cake yeast soon after purchase for it to remain viable. Active dry yeast works best when you mix it with water to activate the yeast. You mix instant yeast together with the other dry ingredients prior to adding the liquid to your dough. Quick-rise yeast multiplies faster than the other types and can be a time saver. I have had great luck using the Red Star® brand of yeast in both the active dry and quick-rise formulations. You can frequently find instant yeast packaged in one-pound packages for use by professional bakeries but you can sometimes find it packaged for home use. If you bake pizza (or yeast breads) frequently, you might want to buy yeast in bulk. It is generally available at health food stores and bulk food stores at a fraction of the per pizza cost of the packets you find in supermarkets.

You might find several types of yeast at a health-food store or specialty food retailer. If so, ask whether the yeast you choose is cultivated to make bread. Otherwise, you might be surprised at the outcome of your recipe.

Yeast does impart some subtle flavor to the dough as it grows. The longer the dough rises and the longer the yeast has to multiply, the stronger the flavor. You might experiment with allowing the dough to rise for eight to twelve hours and see if you can tell the difference in the taste of the dough. You can make a “sponge” consisting of flour, water, and yeast (as described in the California-style Pizza recipe) and let the yeast multiply for one to three days for even more pronounced taste.

Wild Yeast

Sourdough starter is a wild yeast culture that imparts a distinctive sour flavor to the dough. You can purchase a sourdough starter or you can let a sponge made with very little commercial baker’s yeast go “wild” by letting it grow on your counter for five to ten days. The conditions in which the starter grows such as the amount of sugar, the strain of yeast that thrives locally, and the other starter ingredients a can influence the starter’s flavor. After you have established a sourdough starter, you can keep it in your refrigerator between uses. As you take out some starter to make sourdough, replenish the starter with equal parts of flour and water so that the wild yeast can continue to multiply. For example, if you take out one cup of starter, replenish the starter with a half-cup of flour and a half cup of water. The more frequently a sourdough starter is used and replenished, the stronger sourdough personality it will have.

Preparation Techniques

The
Passionate About Pizza System

You will make great homemade pizza every time you try if you ignite your passion and follow a systematic approach to making pizza. Plan your pizza-making activities, use the same equipment and high-quality ingredients each time, use proven PREPARATION TECHNIQUES, rely on your recipes, and work to make continual improvements.

Preparation Techniques

Working with yeast dough can be a little intimidating. You have seen a pizza chef stretching out pizza dough and throwing it around as if it is no big deal, but you may have thought, “I could never do that!” Well, I am here to tell you that you can make a great pizza. It is not difficult and I am going to describe just how to do it.

You will find a lot more detail in this chapter than is contained in most pizza cookbooks. The reason is that by sharing the pizza-making experiences I have had, you will benefit from all the tricks I have learned by trial and error. The information can help you overcome the fear and uncertainty of doing something new. The section describes the following (click to follow link):

Mixing Dough
Kneading Dough
Letting Dough Rise
Preparing Your Oven
Preparing Toppings
Letting Dough Rest
Storing Dough
Shaping Pizza
Handling Shaped Dough
Assembling Pizza
Pizza Peel Technique
Baking Pizza
Serving Pizza
Storing Pizza
Reheating Pizza

Basic Pizza Dough

Here is a preview of my favorite Basic Pizza Dough recipe. You will find this and other pizza dough recipes in the Dough Recipes section starting on
page 87.
If you have not already chosen a dough recipe to use for your first time through the preparation techniques, I recommend that you use Basic Pizza Dough. By the way, Basic Pizza Dough is the dough pictured on the previous page.

Basic Pizza Dough is the most common type of dough used in pizza. This dough is not too fancy or too bland. It is easy to make and shape and you can use it for almost any type of pizza. Basic Pizza Dough produces a crust that tastes good and crunches nicely when baked on a pizza stone, on a pizza screen, or in a pizza pan.

Pizzerias make their dough in large batches hours ahead of time. They use machines to mix it, knead it, let it rise, and prepare it for extended storage. They use less yeast and dough conditioners to compensate for this longer resting time; as a result, you cannot just use their recipe when making homemade pizza. Basic Pizza Dough performs at home similarly to the dough used by most pizzerias.

Makes one fourteen to sixteen inch thin-style pizza.

1 cup lukewarm tap water (105 – 115 degrees F)
1 teaspoon sugar
1 package (about 3/4 Tablespoon) active dry yeast (regular or quick-rise)
2 Tablespoons olive oil
1 1/4 to 1 1/2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
1 1/4 to 1 1/2 cups unbleached bread flour
1 teaspoon salt (I do not recommend omitting the salt)
unbleached all-purpose flour (for kneading and shaping)

Flour
– You can vary the amount of flour in the dough within the range given in the recipe. Using two and a half cups will result in softer dough that is easier to stretch and has a bubblier crust. Using two and three quarters to three cups will result in stiffer dough that is better for tossing around. I mix a bag of all-purpose flour with a bag of bread flour to make it easier to measure out the flour mixture; you might also find this useful.

Water Temperature
– High temperatures kill yeast. When in doubt, use cooler rather than hotter water. Cool (even cold) water will not hurt the yeast; it will just slow down the rising process slightly.

Sugar
– The sugar in the dough is food for the yeast. This allows the yeast to multiply robustly and produces a slightly faster and higher rising dough. You can use a similar amount of almost any sweetener. You will want to experiment so you know that the sweetener you use does not kill yeast. I have used sugar, honey, malt powder, and molasses with success.

Now, on to the preparation techniques!

Mixing Dough

The goal is to mix the right amount of the proper ingredients together to create uniform dough. Good dough has all the ingredients evenly distributed throughout the dough. There are two basic methods – the dry mix and wet mix methods. Both work well, so use the method that suits your fancy. I generally use the wet mix method because it gives me a chance to see that the yeast is active.

There is one important thing to keep in mind. Whatever you do,
do not kill the yeast.
Yeast is an organism and it must live to do its work; you can kill it with too much heat. Do not use liquid that is too hot. You will be safe if you keep the temperature of the liquid lukewarm or cooler, below 105 to 115 degrees Fahrenheit. Some brands of yeast call for higher temperatures than that, especially when using the dry mix method. You should be safe if you follow the yeast manufacturer’s recommendations.

Dry Mix Method

Put one third or so of the total amount of flour and all of the other dry ingredients in a mixing bowl. Mix the dry ingredients together with a whisk or a spoon. Food scientists designed instant yeast specifically to work best with the dry-mix method. If you prefer this method, you might want to use instant dry yeast when you make dough.

Stir in the warm liquid and oil. Mix well to combine. Stir until you reach a smooth consistency with no lumps. Add the remaining flour (to the smaller end of the range of flour listed in the recipe) and mix well until the dough comes together. You may need to add up to an additional half-cup or so of flour if the dough is very wet or sticky.