Trying Caputo Pizzeria flour in a formulation in my deck oven 1/09/2012

I asked and listened to Roberto at Keste about how to use Caputo in a lower temperature deck oven. Roberto said since the higher heat of a WFO bakes Caputo differently you need to add sugar to the formulation and also use a higher TF for a pie to bake okay when using Caputo. Roberto said that the hotter oven drives out moisture in the dough faster, so that is why a higher TF is needed.
I searched the forum yesterday about using Caputo in a lower temperature oven and found Larry’s thread at http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,10475.msg92602.html#msg92602  and found where Peter converted the formulation at Reply 10 http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,10475.msg92679.html#msg92679  I used less cake yeast in the formulation, because I wanted a two day fermented dough, and also changed the soybean oil to olive oil, but used the rest of the formulation, but for a 14” pizza using Caputo Pizzeria flour. I also used a TF of 0.105 since Roberto said to use a higher TF.


I had wanted to do a room only temperature fermentation, but was afraid since some egg is used in the formulation, I was worried about how that would work, so I used a bulk ferment at room temperature for 5 hrs, then balled the dough, and now am cold fermenting until tomorrow.
I have no idea how this will work or bake in my oven tomorrow, but will post whether it works or not.

These are the pictures of after the dough was mixed, after it was balled yesterday, and how the dough ball looks now. I oiled the plastic container and dough ball with Pam.

Norma 

This is how the experiment turned out on 1/10/2012

Steve and I thought the first attempt at a Caputo pie made in the deck oven went well. There couls have been a little better browning of the rim, but there was oven spring, a nice texture, and good bottom crust browning. Even though Steve and I both could taste the salt in the crumb, the taste of the salt wasn’t too much. The bottom crust was a little crispy.

The dough ball was left at room temperature today for 6 hrs. before making the Caputo pizza with fresh cake yeast.

Norma

Another Mellow Mushroom Attempt after 2 day cold ferment 1/03/2012

I knew I wouldn’t have time this Monday to make 5 dough balls for a MM clone, so I decided to make one dough ball for a MM clone on Sunday and let the dough ball cold ferment for two days to see how it would go without freezing the dough ball. The MM clone dough ball that was fermented for 2 days did work out well in making a pizza today. The MM clone pizza baked about the same. I did use the Whirl to baste the rim and tasted it. The Whirl tasted like the stuff that is put on buttered popcorn in the movie theaters.

Norma

Inspiration from our NY fanatics trip-Neapolitan Pizzas!! 1/07/2012

Steve and I had a fairly long trip home from our NY Pizza Fanatics trip, (so we had awhile to talk about it) and Steve said since it was supposed to be nice in our area on Saturday he was going to fire-up his WFO and makes some Neapolitan pies. Steve invited me to his home to bake some pies too. I thought to myself oh yes, I will be there with “rings on my fingers and bells on my toes”. I can’t miss an opportunity to watch or bake in a WFO, and after we had all the inspiration from the Neapolitan pizzerias we visited this was one opportunity I sure didn’t want to miss.

Both Steve and I had thought about Roberto and his talks about how to making dough to be able to bake in any situation. I didn’t ask Steve how he was going to go about making his dough, but I had thought about what I might do since I only had a little over one day to make my dough. I decided to make dough the old-fashioned way with no real recipe or formulation. I mixed fresh cake yeast with water, added ground fine sea salt, and water to an undetermined amount of Caputo Pizzeria flour. I mixed more cake yeast into the mix, because I wanted my dough to be fairly active, so it would taste better in a little over a days time. I also kept adding flour until I thought the water had absorbed enough flour. I thought I had make enough dough for 2 dough balls. The dough was left at room temperature to rise overnight. In the morning it had fermented a lot. I punched it down, 3 different times this morning, then balled around 12:00 pm today. I only lightly balled the two dough balls. Each of my dough balls weighed 8.1 oz. My dough was only fermented at room temperature with no refrigeration.

I also bought a bottle of wine today that Craig had recommended. I couldn’t fine the vintage 2008 at my liquor store, so I had to settle for 2009. The wine went great with all the pizzas. To add to the fanatic theme I wore my pizza earrings and also wore my necklace with a little slice of pizza and the little pizza cutter.

The pictures of my dough and pizzas are first and Steve’s pictures of his pizzas are second. Steve also took pictures of his pizzas, but I don’t know if he wants to also post them. If anyone wants to know about Steve’s Neapolitan dough they can ask.

At least I know now that I can make a Neapolitan dough from scratch and it will work okay.

Norma

Steve's Pies