Pizza stone + peel for toaster ovens = perfect pizza

[Bonobo]

I am a Long Island boy and I know my pizza. In fact, my first job was at a pizza place when I was 14.

I just got this pizza stone and pizza peel from Amazon and the pizza is just perfect with it!

Made some margarita, some pizza biancos with mushroom and salami. Man they were great.

BTW, one strong opinion I have about sauce is that you use crushed tomatoes or canned whole tomatoes that you pulverize WITHOUT cooking it. Add a splash of olive oil and some oregano, but DO NOT cook those poor tomatoes. The flavor is so much better that way. Oh, and do try to use real mozzarella.= and as good parmesan as you can get. Oh, and thin, very thin crust.

[Denninmi]

1. Do you need to remove excess moisture from the tomatoes?

I would worry about a soggy top crust. Do you use a relatively small amount of tomatoes, or let them sit in a sieve and drain or something along those lines?

[Bonobo]

2. Not at all.

I don't drain the tomatoes and I don't think there was any issue with sogginess. I have a very thin crust and so, I think, the crispiness of the bottom is the predominant thing you feel re the crust. Naturally you want some juicy tomato-goodness up top.

Great question though.

[RevStPatrick]

3. Pizza Peel?

Why have I never heard it called that until just now?
You learn something new every day...

(did you get a metal or a wooden peel?)

[Major Nikon]

5. I have a stainless steel pizza peel

The wooden ones are less apt to stick, but are thicker which I don't like. The one I have has a folding handle which makes storage nice.

[Major Nikon]

4. Canned tomatoes are already cooked

All canned food must be heated in the can to kill germs.

Sometimes I use fresh tomatoes and don't cook them before when I'm making pizza. I'll dice up tomato very small and then wrap it with cheesecloth and squeeze out all the moisture I can. Then I season the tomato and put it on the pizza after it has been brushed with olive oil. I always use real mozzarella. I prefer to put it on the pizza in bigger chunks intermittently rather than covering the entire pizza. I much prefer a NY style thin crust.

[Catherina]

6. Awesome. Now let's talk dough

I need your recipe for an authentic NY crust I can make at home. I've tried many but none of them duplicate the NY crust properly.

[northoftheborder]

7. Yes, i would like to know how to make the thin crisp crust also. mine are always doughy.

[Catherina]

8. I like mine a bit chewy but I'll take thin crisp too!

I hope Bonobo will share with us because the recipes I tried from the net were a total fail. I hope the secret isn't spinning lol.

Are yours at least thin?

[Major Nikon]

14. You may not be allowing it to rise long enough

You also need a dough that has a lot of gluten. I always use bread flour. It has a higher protein content which translates to more gluten which allows you to work the dough thinner while still retaining a lot of structure. I've heard that many professsional pizza joints use high gluten flour which has more protein than even bread flour, but I always keep bread flour on hand so that's what I use.

Basically what I do is use more or less the same recipe I use for bread, except I add some olive oil and I make it a little wetter than I would for bread. You don't want to skimp on the kneading or rising because that's what's going to give your dough the structure you'll need to get it really thin. I put the dough in a plastic bag (I reuse produce bags from the supermarket) and let it rise overnight in the refrigerator. You also want to learn how to toss the dough if you want a really thin crust.

[northoftheborder]

21. Very good hints - I don't let pizza dough rise - and use reg. flour;

However, I think I'll skip learning how to toss!

[Major Nikon]

22. I'm not that good at it

But then again I don't do it all day long. You just toss the dough up in the air and give it a twist so it spins. The centrifugal force pushes the dough outward in a circle to stretch the dough. When it gets larger, I rarely can spin it fast enough to get a nice circle, but I just go with the rustic look.

[northoftheborder]

23. Rustic is good!

[A HERETIC I AM]

9. You want to know one of the most important ingredients in a New York Pizza dough?

The water.



New York Municipal tap water.

I'm not kidding.

[sir pball]

10. +6.02e23

I have a dough recipe (no I will not share) that was damned good until I moved here...then, hoo boy! I get better bones than Lombardi's in my home oven with $12 of unglazed quarry tiles.

[Catherina]

11. Lol, well I certainly won't find that!

But if Bonobo can figure it out in Japan, I'll take my chances down here But a recipe i need dear a heretic i am.

[A HERETIC I AM]

13. The Joy of Cooking one is pretty good;

Combine in a large mixing bowl or the bowl of your stand mixer:

1 Package (2 1/4 teaspoons) active dry yeast
1 1/3 cups warm water (105 to 115 F)

Add:
3 1/2 to 3 3/4 cups all purpose flour.
2 Tablespoons Olive Oil
1 Tablespoon Salt
1 Tablespoon Sugar (optional)

Mix by hand or on low speed, for about a minute to blend. Kneed by hand for ten minutes or with the dough hook until the dough is smooth and elastic. Transfer to a lightly oiled bowl, turn over to coat with the oil, cover with plastic wrap and place in a warm (75 to 80 F) place to rise, about 1 1/2 hours or until it doubles in volume.


The rest is easy. Punch it down, cut it into two or more pieces depending on how big you want to make the pizzas, Roll them into balls and let them rest for ten minutes or so. Then roll it out thin and stretch to the size you want, top how you want and bake in a VERY hot oven, either on a baking sheet or a stone.


Simple.

[Catherina]

16. This is awesome, thank you! n/t

[A HERETIC I AM]

18. My pleasure! n/t

[Bonobo]

12. This works well for me.

280 g. flour
150 ml. water
2 g. salt
2 tbsp. olive oil
3 g. yeast

[Catherina]

15. Then rise? Knead? Rest? Roll? Spin?

Like in the recipe above? Thanks for the basic measurements. I see pizza for dinner

[Bonobo]

17. Let it rise once, yeah.

If you are doing it by hand, by all means, do plenty of kneading before you let it rise.

We bought ourselves a bread machine recently because we got tired of all the mess and wanted to eat more bread. Now we make loafs daily for the family (5) and occasionally make things like:

Pizza
Bagels
Croissants

Very delicious French bread called epi bread which you can fill with ham and mustard/mayo, etc. It is cut in a special way to make it look like a stalk of wheat.

[A HERETIC I AM]

19. Now THAT'S cool. n/t

[Catherina]

20. Thanks Bonobo

That epi is gorgeous. I can't wait to try your pizza dough recipe, hopefully tonight. Thanks again.