Next Luigi's Attempt 11/01/2011

The attempt for a Luigi’s pizza went okay today, but there could have been a little more color on the bottom crust.  The Luigi’s pie did have a good taste in the crust.  The Luigi’s attempt did seem like a NY style pie to Steve, my taste testers, and me. This is a video of Steve cutting the Luigi’s attempt.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JxmDYGRS7ys 

Norma

Nancy Silverton's Pizza Dough 11/01/2011

The Nancy Silverton Dough worked out well Tuesday.  There one thing I didn’t understand from the experiment I did yesterday, compared to the experiment I did this week.  This week there wasn’t as much rye flavor in the crust as last week.  I don’t know why that happened, when all I changed was flours in the formula.  I used Better for Bread flour last week, and Mondako flour this week.  I wouldn’t have thought the flour brand would have made a difference in tasting the rye in Nancy Silverton Dough.  The Nancy Silverton Dough was easy to open and slid off the peel well.  The taste of the crumb was good and different.

Norma

preferment Lehmann pizza baked at a lower temperature 11/02/2011

I did the same experiment I did last week, again this week, to see how a preferment Lehmann dough bakes at a lower temperature in the deck oven.  As can be seen the baking temperature on the stone was 453 degrees F, right before I slid the pie into the deck oven.  My dough ball wasn’t warmed-up enough either, as can be seen how it wanted to bubble in the middle in the picture.  I used my bubble popper to deflate those bubbles.  I know a deck ovens bakes differently than home ovens, but just wanted to show that a deck oven can bake the preferment Lehmann dough into pizzas at a lower bake temperature.  The bottom crust even gets brown.

Norma

Another Attempt at the Mellow Mushroom Pizza 11/02/2011

My attempted MM’s clone turned out good in some ways, and bad in some ways.  The good news was it was it looked like the same color as a real MM’s dough ball, and had about the same color as a MM’s baked pie in the crumb. Picture 362jpg. is the saved crust crumb (that was frozen) from a real MM’s pie compared to my crumb. The dough ball handled well, and could be stretched, twirled and tossed.  It could have been tossed for a long while, and I don’t think it would have ever tore even if I had tossed it many more times than I did.  That darn Steve wouldn’t stopped taking a video of me, after I had finished tossing the dough. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_rN5-mp-6ig 

The bad things about the MM’s attempt with the Homemaid molasses. was the hydration was too low in my opinion, because now the crumb was too tight and bready.  I have no idea what MM's is using in their dough besides molasses, but this crust and crumb didn’t have any sweetness, even though I did used 11% Domino Homemaid molasses in the formula.  It leads me to believe that MM’s must be using some kind of “unrefined sugar” in their dough.  I could be wrong, and maybe they did find a “fancy molasses” that I don’t know about.  I would have thought that 11% Homemaid molasses would have given at least a little sweetness in the crust and crumb, but it didn’t.

Norma

Thanksgiving "Pumpkin Cranberry" Pie (with a Betty Crocker Mix) 11/5/2011

Another mystery pizza today.  This mystery pizza would be good to serve on Thanksgiving for a dessert. It has both traditional pumpkin and cranberries.

I first took some frozen cranberries out of my freezer that I had saved since last Christmas.  They were still good.  I made a simple syrup of water and sugar, then added the cranberries and cooked for 10 minutes.  I squeezed a lemon, and also used some zest from the lemon in the mix with the cranberries.  When the cranberries were almost finished cooking, I added black grapes that were sliced.  The lemon juice mixed with the cranberries, sugar, and grapes mixture had a nice taste after it was finished and cooled.

I mixed the “mystery mix” with pumpkin in the mix, with Peter’s “goody” bag.

The “Thanksgiving Mystery Pizza”, was dressed with the a little St. Dalfour Royal Fig, Grande mozzarella, and then the cranberry mixture.  When the pie was almost finished baking I took some ground pumpkin seeds (I had toasted from my Halloween pumpkin) and sprinkled them over the pie.  After the mystery pumpkin pie was baked, I brushed melted butter on the rim and sprinkled with Parmesan cheese.

The mystery pizza was bake on the bottom rake of my oven on the stone at about 500 degrees F for 8 ½ minutes.

Now, what member wouldn’t want this for a Thanksgiving dessert. The crust even had pumpkin pie spices in it.  Being from Pa. it is always traditional to have pumpkin pie for Thanksgiving.

Norma

More Greek pizza with the preferment Lehmann dough 11/03/2011

I just wanted to add a post, and some pictures of how the Greek pizzas are turning out with the preferment Lehmann dough.  My Greek pizzas from the preferment Lehmann dough are more like a Sicilian pizza, (because they are thicker than a regular Greek pizza), but I still call them Greek pizzas.  I have started to grease the steel pan with corn oil to develop more of a crunch on the bottom crust, and so far that has worked well.  I use a fairly high amount of oil to grease the steel pan, so the bottom crust almost fries.  After the bake there is still a lot of corn oil in the steel pan.

I had a new customer that commented on how good this Greek pizza looked on Tuesday.  She decided to try a slice, and walked about with it.  After a little while she came back and said that the Greek pizza was the best pizza she had ever eaten, and she said she had tasted many pizzas.  She asked me if I had a regular pizza business anywhere, and I said no, I just operated this small pizza stand.  She bought the rest of the pizza, and also bought some regular slices of my NY style pizzas for her husband that doesn‘t like thick pizzas.  The lady asked for my cell number, and my home phone number, and said she is going to be ordering whole Greek pizzas the day before she comes to market, so they are ready when she is finished shopping at market.

We also made a Greek pizza with Alfredo sauce with minced garlic in the sauce with fresh vegetables, and also another kind of Greek pizza with different dressings.  The Greek style pizzas are starting to get some more attention.  I need to soon give some small slices for samples, to see if potential customers might like Greek pizzas from the preferment Lehmann dough.

Norma

All Dry Mix Pizza, except adding the water 10/30/2011

My dry mix MM’s attempt was made this evening.  Since I had used a much lower hydration than I did before, I had wondered how that was going to work, with all dry ingredients in the mix.  I mixed hot water into the mix with a spatula, then balled right away, and coated the dough ball with corn meal. The mix looked much drier than my last attempt. The dough ball didn’t look really smooth when I did the ball.  The dough ball was left to ferment for 30 minutes near my oven.

When I went to open the dough ball it opened well.  The MM’s dry mix skin was dressed with Les’s chunky tomato sauce, mozzarella, and cut out pepperoni to try and look like a pumpkin face.  The pizza baked well at a little over 500 degrees F, (in my home oven on the pizza stone, on the bottom rack) for about 7 minutes. This attempt was for a 14” pizza.

The final pizza was good, but I think more water needs to be put into the formula because the crumb wasn’t as open as I wanted.  The taste of the pizza was similar to a MM’s pizza, but I don’t think it had enough molasses taste.  The sweetness of the crust was a little sweet, but I am not sure if it was sweet enough.  The bottom crust browned well.  The slices could be folded something like MM’s.

All in all, this experiment did work out well.  I never would have know this dough was fermented for such a short time.  The  taste of the crust and rim were good.

I am lucky to be able to try an all dry mix pizza. I was given samples of dry shortening powder, dry molasses, and other dry ingredients.

Norma