I was invited to Steve's home for a party with his home brewing club and to make pizza in his WFO. Steve, his friends, and I all made dough to bake in Steve's WFO.
The first pictures are of the pies I made from my doughs.
I used Craig’s method and used the Ischia starter for the one dough I made. For the other dough, I had wanted to use John’s (dellavechia) Keste’s clone, but I went to three supermarkets and they all said now they have stopped carrying cake yeast, because the cake yeast has to be thrown away too much. I could have gone to a supermarket much farther away, but I didn’t have the time to do that, so I just used John’s formula, but substituted the Ischia starter in the formula. I also wanted to make some other doughs posted by members, but my time was limited to try them out. I want to thank anyone that gave me ideas for the Neapolitan pies, even though I didn’t get to try all the ideas out. I need more practice in making Neapolitan doughs, because my Neapolitan pies didn’t turn out like some of the members that do make Neapolitan pies here on the forum. Since it was dreary and raining most of the time at Steve’s yesterday, some of the home brewing club didn’t show-up because the weather was not the nicest day to be outside.
Two of Steve’s friends bought their own doughs. Both of their doughs sure were different than any other doughs I have seen before. His one friend brought dough that he made a few hours earlier and just mixes and let it develop itself. Something like a no-knead dough. It can been seen in the glass jar. That dough sure was lively. That friend rolled his dough and then stretched it. It sure could be stretched nicely. He then formed a rim by rolling the rim. I found that interesting. His dough makes more like a flatbread pizza. He also made , many of his own dressings, which all were great. This friend uses some kind of flour with wheat germ in the flour, that he buys from an Amish store in our area. I think the wheat germ can be seen in the one picture of the dough. He also used cornmeal on the peel to launch his pies. I would have thought his pies would have burnt on the bottom, but they didn’t.
Steve’s other friend that made dough also uses a much different dough than a Neapolitan dough. He is the man that first bakes the pizza on one side, then dresses the pie, then puts it back into the oven again. He also made a lot of his own dressings, including one with figs, and another with apple sausage he made himself. The apple sausage was delicious.
Sorry, I didn’t get to take pictures of all the pies that were made yesterday. What a great pizza day, to be able to get to try out so many kinds of different pizzas. Members of the brewing club, did also bring salads, grilled food on Steve’s BBQ grill, and also brought different desserts. I sure ate way to much pizza and other foods yesterday.
Steve’s WFO was mostly in the 800 degrees in temperature when the different pies were baked. The bake times still were quick. There were 4 tents set-up to keep people out of the rain and also to help keep the pizzas and DJ equipment from getting wet.
I had left over doughs, as did others. I froze my doughs and might try to use some in the deck oven to try and make greek pizza, or might also try one for a regular pizza. I don’t think the regular pizza will turn out well, because my deck oven isn’t hot enough to use with Caputo flours.
Norma
