There isn’t a minute I am not thinking of a specific vegetable to cook, some bread I want to bake, a dessert I would love to eat, but pizza well, it’s just one of those things. There, I just want to make the perfect dough; light, crisp, slightly bruciato (how I love that word!).
Certainly my goal is a sourdough based pie, sure a Napolatano with just water, salt and flour. Of course I know you need a 800 F oven, but I just don’t have one, yet! This is my latest effort, a bit unorthodox, no sauce, just fresh tomatoes with cheese, basil and a bit of that nduja for some heat and salty pork goodness.
I based the recipe on an assortment of wonderful information gleened from Pizzamaking.com And that information is based on the one time pizzaoila and blogger Foolish Poolish Bakes, who sadly is no longer blogging, but still inspires!
If I recall right, the dough has a 72-75 percent hydration, one percent salt and something around 30 percent levain (I used my 100 percent hydrated sourdough). My levain was already percolated so I used it straight from the jar. I made up the dough, which rose in bulk about four hours and then in the fridge overnight.
The next day when I got home I shaped two 270 gram balls and let them warm up for about three hours. Then I flattened and stretched the dough by hand, and baked it in my Cuisinart baker oven (pre-heated for about 40 minutes) at broil with the stone on the top shelf. And then it baked for about 20-25 minutes until browned and slightly spotted – mai cosi bruciato!
Beautiful! What kind of cheese did you use?
Mozzarella, thanks!