Romancing the [Pizza] Stone

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Goons with Spoons > Romancing the [Pizza] Stone

Easychair Bootson: May 7, 2004; _{Where's the last guy?

Ultimo hombre.

Last man standing.

Must've been one.}

After much cursing of pizzas that stick to my metal peel and cornmeal that burns and stinks up the joint, I've settled on a nearly-foolproof method using my basic home oven.

I heat my pizza stone as hot as I can for an hour, occasionally kicking it up to broil. I press out my dough onto parchment paper, which I trim so as not to have too much sticking out. I brush the outside of the pie (the crust) lightly with olive oil and parbake at 500 (max temp) for about 3 minutes.

When I take the dough out of the oven, I kick it back up to broil while I assemble the pizza while it's still on parchment. Then, using a peel, I slide the pizza off of the parchment and into the oven, turn off of broil and down to 500, and bake for 6-8 minutes.

# ¿ Oct 6, 2011 22:48

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# ¿ Apr 26, 2024 05:39

Easychair Bootson: May 7, 2004; _{Where's the last guy?

Ultimo hombre.

Last man standing.

Must've been one.}

Radio Help posted:

Does anyone know where I can find instant yeast? It's in tons of different pizza recipes, and I have been to pretty much every style of grocery store in Portland and all I can find is Active Dry.

That's pretty surprising that it's not on the shelf right next to the active dry. Instant is also known as quick-rise yeast or bread machine yeast. I think Fleishman's calls theirs "rapid rise."

# ¿ Jan 7, 2012 23:18

Easychair Bootson: May 7, 2004; _{Where's the last guy?

Ultimo hombre.

Last man standing.

Must've been one.}

I used my new FibraMent baking stone for the first time tonight. I already had a decent stone, but it was round and I wanted something that used the rectangular oven space a little more efficiently. I was able to fit two individual-sized pizzas on the stone, and it worked great.

One word of warning: The directions for the stone speak of a slight off-odor that may be emitted the first time heating the stone. In reality, it's a strong, chemical glue-like odor that takes several hours at to dissipate. The hood fan didn't do much - you need open windows. After about 5-6 hours in a hot oven, though, the smell is gone.

650g AP flour (I used KA)
14g kosher salt
3g instant yeast
450g cool water

Mix together, knead, shape into a ball and put into an oiled/covered bowl. Set at room temp for 30 minutes, then refrigerate overnight. Divide dough balls into 6 pieces, brush with olive oil, let rest for 2 hours.

I shaped them by pressing from the center out (no pulling/tossing) on lightly-floured parchment. I brushed the edges with olive oil, trimmed the parchment, then parbaked for a few minutes, then topped and went back into the oven (minus the parchment) for another 4-5 minutes.

# ¿ Feb 21, 2012 04:18

Easychair Bootson: May 7, 2004; _{Where's the last guy?

Ultimo hombre.

Last man standing.

Must've been one.}

niss posted:

Cooked some pizzas for dinner tonight.

them's some beautiful pizzas.

# ¿ May 15, 2012 01:46

Easychair Bootson: May 7, 2004; _{Where's the last guy?

Ultimo hombre.

Last man standing.

Must've been one.}

Shooting Blanks posted:

http://www.bakingstone.com/

You're welcome.

The manufacturer says that it'll emit a slight odor when you're breaking it in, but the odor was very strong and unpleasant for me. It took several hours (at least 3, probably more like 6) of heat to dissipate, but it eventually did. Now it works really well with no odor.

# ¿ Jul 13, 2012 20:28

Easychair Bootson: May 7, 2004; _{Where's the last guy?

Ultimo hombre.

Last man standing.

Must've been one.}

I'm looking for some sauce advice. Can anybody give me a review of Peter Reinhart's all-purpose marinara sauce (the one made with tomato puree)? I've always spent way more time on my crust than on sauce, preferring to simply use Prego traditional out of the jar, but I do like the way that it tastes.

It'll be going on a NY-style pizza in small quantities. Other sauce recommendations are welcome as well.

# ¿ Sep 5, 2012 17:39

Easychair Bootson: May 7, 2004; _{Where's the last guy?

Ultimo hombre.

Last man standing.

Must've been one.}

Killer robot posted:

I've been pretty happy with this recipe only reducing the honey quite a bit since it comes out too sweet. It's good and simple, tomato paste base, and if you make it often you can just make a bunch of the spice mix ahead of time to just add a couple teaspoons to each batch. Probably good for about two full sized pizzas if you don't like the sauce heavy.

I'll definitely try this. Hell, I may make a few recipes and see what works. Some of the pictures of that recipe have about a quart of sauce on one pizza. Weirdos.

# ¿ Sep 5, 2012 21:45

Easychair Bootson: May 7, 2004; _{Where's the last guy?

Ultimo hombre.

Last man standing.

Must've been one.}

I usually parbake my crust for 2-3 minutes on the stone with parchment under it, remove the whole thing and assemble the pizza still on the parchment, then slide the pizza off of the peel + parchment and onto the stone.

If you plan on leaving the parchment in the oven, it helps to trim the excess. It'll be fine at normal household oven temps (500 degF), in my experience.

I love parchment paper for baking.

# ¿ Sep 12, 2012 17:28

Easychair Bootson: May 7, 2004; _{Where's the last guy?

Ultimo hombre.

Last man standing.

Must've been one.}

His Divine Shadow posted:

I'm a bit unfamiliar with american terms here. The paper I would use translated to "oven paper" or "baking paper" and is meant to be used for baking in the oven, I got another paper that's called "butter paper" which is meant for 'cold' applications only. I use that for things like separating burger patties and whatnot.

Yep, you've got it right.

# ¿ Sep 13, 2012 15:08

Easychair Bootson: May 7, 2004; _{Where's the last guy?

Ultimo hombre.

Last man standing.

Must've been one.}

nummy posted:

I par-bake my crust for about 2 minutes on my stone (using parchment paper) then build and finish without the paper. Gets nice and crispy!

Also make sure to let the stone get nice and hot first...

Yep, this is how to do it for a stress-free transfer to the stone.

# ¿ Oct 6, 2012 22:38

Easychair Bootson: May 7, 2004; _{Where's the last guy?

Ultimo hombre.

Last man standing.

Must've been one.}

For those with both a baking steel and baking stone, do you use the stone for anything now?

# ¿ Jan 14, 2014 15:33

Easychair Bootson: May 7, 2004; _{Where's the last guy?

Ultimo hombre.

Last man standing.

Must've been one.}

The wife and I had friends over for pizza on Friday, so of course the one that I threw together for lunch on Sunday turned out the best.

Reinhart NY style dough cooked on a baking steel under the broiler for about 4 minutes

# ¿ Feb 24, 2014 13:38

Easychair Bootson: May 7, 2004; _{Where's the last guy?

Ultimo hombre.

Last man standing.

Must've been one.}

Sointenly posted:

I have the bakers percentages, would it be ok for me to simply cut the water, salt, years, est using those percentages?

Absolutely. 1240g of flour should make enough dough to serve like 8-12 people, right? Seems like more than enough for an initial test drive.

# ¿ Mar 12, 2014 10:41

Easychair Bootson: May 7, 2004; _{Where's the last guy?

Ultimo hombre.

Last man standing.

Must've been one.}

Zhent posted:

Can someone recommend a scale that measures in tenths of grams? Many recipes call for 1.5, 2.5 g of yeast and I haven't come across anything that exact.

I use one of these. You just fill the hopper full of yeast and punch in the amount in grams that you want to dispense. Accurate to +/- 0.01 grams.

(not a serious recommendation nor do I actually put ingredients in the hopper, but I do use the scale for yeast and salt measurements)

# ¿ Mar 14, 2014 13:38

Easychair Bootson: May 7, 2004; _{Where's the last guy?

Ultimo hombre.

Last man standing.

Must've been one.}

Has anybody used the EXO peel?

http://www.amazon.com/EXO-Super-Pizza-Solid-White/dp/B001T6OVPO

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jk786qxqfL4

# ¿ Jun 12, 2014 20:56

Easychair Bootson: May 7, 2004; _{Where's the last guy?

Ultimo hombre.

Last man standing.

Must've been one.}

Che Delilas posted:

That's cute and all but at the end of the day you are spending 64 dollars on a loving pizza peel.

Put parchment paper on a cheap peel, build your pizza directly on that, trim, and use the muscles of your wrist and arm to slide the pizza into your oven. Use leftover money to buy great beer to go with your delicious pizza that you made without expensive gimmicks.

I parbake on parchment for about 2 minutes, then build my pizza and slide it on to the steel. But I could probably get a better crust if I went straight to the steel, and I have never been great at transferring. Kind of gimmicky but if it works and doesn't break it could be money well spent.

# ¿ Jun 13, 2014 00:06

Easychair Bootson: May 7, 2004; _{Where's the last guy?

Ultimo hombre.

Last man standing.

Must've been one.}

Those pizzas look amazing.

# ¿ Jul 22, 2014 03:03

Easychair Bootson: May 7, 2004; _{Where's the last guy?

Ultimo hombre.

Last man standing.

Must've been one.}

Some great looking pizzas ITT lately. I need to get back into the game.

# ¿ Sep 2, 2014 12:40

Easychair Bootson: May 7, 2004; _{Where's the last guy?

Ultimo hombre.

Last man standing.

Must've been one.}

Aaronicon posted:

Speaking of sauces, does anyone have a go-to for a pizza BBQ sauce? Something rich, dark, but not hot-spicey, with a bit of sweetness. It feels cheating that I make my own tomato pizza sauce (uncooked with not much more than a couple leaves of fresh basil, some smoked salt, and dried oregano) but I just squirt out some bottled stuff for when everyone wants a meaty BBQ pizza. All the bottled ones I've tried are very thick and go on more like a paste than a spreadable sauce like tomato-based.

http://amazingribs.com/recipes/BBQ_sauces/kansas_city_classic_BBQ_sauce.html

# ¿ Mar 15, 2015 14:25

Easychair Bootson: May 7, 2004; _{Where's the last guy?

Ultimo hombre.

Last man standing.

Must've been one.}

ogopogo posted:

Pizzzzza!

Margherita:

Margherita with proscuitto, mushrooms, fig jam:

drat those are beautiful.

# ¿ Jan 14, 2016 14:04

Easychair Bootson: May 7, 2004; _{Where's the last guy?

Ultimo hombre.

Last man standing.

Must've been one.}

ogopogo posted:

Pepperoni and mushroom!

goddamn

# ¿ Sep 13, 2018 22:57

Easychair Bootson: May 7, 2004; _{Where's the last guy?

Ultimo hombre.

Last man standing.

Must've been one.}

Hey pizza thread, I've dipped my toes back into the pizzaiolo world recently after I got a Pizzaque PC6500 propane-powered oven recently as a gift. I've been using this Tony Gemignani dough recipe that someone in this thread recommended and it works great. I made two batches today. Question: If I want to freeze a few of the dough balls, should I wait 36-48 hours for them to cold ferment and then freeze, or is it better to freeze earlier since they'll need to defrost 8-12 hours in the fridge?

# ¿ Dec 28, 2018 03:08

Easychair Bootson: May 7, 2004; _{Where's the last guy?

Ultimo hombre.

Last man standing.

Must've been one.}

Easychair Bootson posted:

Hey pizza thread, I've dipped my toes back into the pizzaiolo world recently after I got a Pizzaque PC6500 propane-powered oven recently as a gift. I've been using this Tony Gemignani dough recipe that someone in this thread recommended and it works great. I made two batches today. Question: If I want to freeze a few of the dough balls, should I wait 36-48 hours for them to cold ferment and then freeze, or is it better to freeze earlier since they'll need to defrost 8-12 hours in the fridge?

To provide an update, I should have done this:

BraveUlysses posted:

i usually freeze before the cold ferment.

As it ended up, a ~48 hour cold ferment + freezing + 18 hour defrost gave me a dough with too little elasticity, and it ended up being too chewy and without a good oven spring. We still ate the hell out of it, but there was a definite drop in quality of the crust.

# ¿ Jan 15, 2019 22:01

Easychair Bootson: May 7, 2004; _{Where's the last guy?

Ultimo hombre.

Last man standing.

Must've been one.}

My boy Chef John (Food Wishes) uses 2 parts Monterey Jack to 1 part cheddar as a stand-in for brick cheese.

# ¿ Jan 18, 2020 03:24

Easychair Bootson: May 7, 2004; _{Where's the last guy?

Ultimo hombre.

Last man standing.

Must've been one.}

Are there any other Pizzacraft PizzaQue pizziolios ITT? I got mine as a gift about 18 months ago and I'm a fan. I think it cost around $150 all in for the oven with legs and a couple of other pieces. It's been months since I fired it up (got on a Detroit-style kick for a while) but I'm itching to get back to it. Curious about others' techniques.

# ¿ May 21, 2020 21:41

Easychair Bootson: May 7, 2004; _{Where's the last guy?

Ultimo hombre.

Last man standing.

Must've been one.}

Yeah those both look amazing but the Fennel Countdown looks just fantastic in both iterations

drat I need to get back to making pizzas

# ¿ Jun 3, 2020 11:17

Easychair Bootson: May 7, 2004; _{Where's the last guy?

Ultimo hombre.

Last man standing.

Must've been one.}

Sorry for the bad photos but I didn�t think this pizza would be worth sharing. I made a Wolfgang Puck style dough on Tuesday which is what I do when I decide at 5 PM that I want to make pizza for dinner. I use about twice the yeast and let the dough rise in the warm oven. The pizza was just okay. On Wednesday I did the second dough ball which had been resting in the fridge and it was tremendously better.

280g flour
170g water
6g kosher salt
5g honey
10g evoo
6g active dry yeast

cooked at ~800F in my Pizzacraft PizzaQue for a hair under 6 minutes

Easychair Bootson fucked around with this message at 13:58 on Jun 11, 2020

# ¿ Jun 11, 2020 13:54

Easychair Bootson: May 7, 2004; _{Where's the last guy?

Ultimo hombre.

Last man standing.

Must've been one.}

chia posted:

The best one last night (and in a long time):

That looks amazing

# ¿ Apr 11, 2021 14:43

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# ¿ Apr 26, 2024 05:39

Easychair Bootson: May 7, 2004; _{Where's the last guy?

Ultimo hombre.

Last man standing.

Must've been one.}

Wolfy posted:

hello i made my first pizza ever and wanted to tell people about it

Basic Detroit deal. At the risk of being controversial, it has pepperoni on it. Went with mozz + jack, as I couldn't get my hands on brick cheese. Someone, perhaps myself, snagged a pep before the photo.

That looks fantastic. Detroit style has a big following amongst my friends.

# ¿ Jan 16, 2023 21:35

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Goons with Spoons > Romancing the [Pizza] Stone