Little more mixing time and folding dough ball more for a Sicilian pie 8/28/2012

I used a little longer mix time in my same formulation and also folded the dough ball more.  I think this works best for me when using GM Full Strength flour, when trying to make a Sicilian pizza.  I use more cheddar than mozzarella on this pie and from what I can tell, it can't be told by just looking at the baked pie that more cheddar cheese is used.

Norma

Using my mom's gas oven for the first time to bake pizzas..should have put the pizza stone on a higher rack..lol..didn't get good rim browning

I am sorry Glutenboy and Craze, but I didn’t go to Steve’s home tonight to bake in his WFO and try your doughs out in a WFO.  I was going to try Glutenboy's formulation and Craze's boli dough in Steve's WFO.  The weathermen were calling for thunderstorms on and off in the evening and maybe flash flooding in our area. When it was time to leave for Steve’s home it was raining heavily in my area. I am not a big fan of driving in any pouring rain when it is dark, so I decided not to go to Steve’s home and to bake your doughs in my mom’s gas oven.


After I got my pizza stone, wooden peel, metal peel, the dough balls and my ingredients together I took them to my mom’s home. It was raining when I got to my mom’s home.

After I was heating her oven up for ½ hr. it stopped raining and didn’t rain the rest of the evening.

I found out my mom’s gas oven can get to 615 degrees F, when heated for an hour. I am really a newbie when baking in someone elses oven and I placed the pizza stone on the bottom rack. After baking the first pie, I realized I should have placed the stone on a higher rack (to get the rim crust browner, but didn’t want to try and take the hot stone out and put it on a higher rack.

Both dough balls opened well and baked well, except for the non browning of the rim crust. The bottom crust did brown well on both pizzas.

I also tried out a new Pizza cheese from Nasonville and although I did grate it myself, it wanted to stick or clump together even when it was cold. I didn’t like the way the Pizza Cheese melted on the pizzas, but the taste of the Pizza cheese was okay.

It can be seen that even I am a newbie when trying to bake in a different kind of oven I never tried before...lol

I didn’t brush either skin rim with olive oil to try and get better rim browning, because I wanted to see how the pizzas baked without that.  The bottom crust were nice a crisp on both pies. 

When baking in a new oven I am trying, I am also a newbie on how different ovens bake.  It is all in the learning process of how to use different oven on how to try and bake pizzas.  I learned a new lesson that even if ovens do get up to higher temperatures there still needs to be some adjustments.  I didn't do the adjustments, but will the next time I try to bake in my mom's gas oven.

Norma  

Pesto, Pesto Creamy Sauce, Johnsonville sausage, Pasta

From the abundance of basil in my garden, I made a pretty decent amount of pesto this morning. I saved some and then used some in a creamy pesto sauce, made with heavy cream and butter. I also used Craig’s method to make Johnsonville sausage to add to the creamy pesto sauce for pasta. I also used some Sriracha sauce in with what Craigs uses in his method for making a better sausage with Johnsonville sausage. The creamy pesto sauce was mixed with wheat pasta and also chopped tomatoes from my garden.


I saved some of the pesto for later and also am saving some of the sausage creamy pesto sauce with sausage to try on a pizza later today.

I thought the fresh creamy pesto sauce with the spiced up Johnsville sausage over pasta had just the right taste for my palate.

I still have loads of basil left outside, so in the next few weeks I will have to use more to make pesto to freeze.

Norma  

lol, another Mack's attempt 8/21/2012

I didn’t know how to go about changing the last formulation for the dough to try another Mack’s attempt, so I just used the same formulation I attempted the last time, but used a little less sugar. I sure wouldn’t think the little less sugar changed the crust of the attempt I did yesterday, but it seemed like it did. I didn’t change the TF at all. The resulting pizza crust did come out different though. I have no idea why that was, unless I didn’t place the pizza the same place on the deck and didn’t rotate the same, or the sauce and cheese were different. In the last minute of the bake, the pizza was seeming to brown more on the bottom crust than I wanted it to, so it was moved to the top deck. I then even put a screen under the pizza for the last 30 seconds.


This attempt at a Mack’s pizza is the closest I have come so far, at least in Steve’s and my opinions. I used 50/50 Great Lakes sharp cheddar and Nasonville cheddar. The Nasonville cheddar is soft, creamy and without much flavor and the Great Lakes sharp cheddar has the sharper flavor and tang. I know Nasonville does melt well when baked on a pizza, but I don‘t like the way it clumps after grating. The Great Lakes sharp cheddar did help some with the clumping since it was added. I had grated the cheddars on Monday, but then purchased a new cheese yesterday at market. It was Amish butter cheese. I decided not to add it to the blend, but would think if I did it would have given the attempt a buttery flavor. I let Pete taste the Amish butter cheese and it does taste like butter, but I didn’t know how it would melt when baking the pizza. That is why I didn’t try it. We did add a little more than 8 oz. of the cheese blend yesterday.

Steve and I were trying to decide if we should make the sauce a little thicker than last week. We decided to make it a little thicker, but not near as thick as in other attempts. It still squeezed out of the plastic squeeze bottom well. I let Steve decide how much spices to add to the Gangi sauce. He came up with the best taste so far using the Gangi sauce. I think he added about 1 teaspoon of Kosher Morton salt, ½ tsp. of regular pepper and a lot of oregano. That amount was for a bigger amount than what was in the squeeze bottle though. We probably would have had enough sauce for at least ½ of another pizza. When I tasted Steve’s additions to the sauce it tasted just like the sauce on a Mack’s pizza. Great job Steve on the sauce!!

This whole attempt produce a very enjoyable pizza and the taste was almost like a Mack’s pizza. The only thing missing was a little buttery flavor and also a little tang. Other than those two things I would rate this Mack’s attempt successful.

Norma