Pizza crust recipe?

@robgmn :

Re : NY Pizza dough:

Here's a link to a sauce recipe from
"The Pizza Bible".
A very comprehensive book I have to say.
There are recipes in it for Detroit style Shields/Buddy's pizza: sort of like Chicago deep dish, but different.

I have not seen those anywhere else.


http://www.thepizzabible.com/posts/ny-sauce-combinations
Thanks! I'll have to give them a try.

i have to chuckle however at the first reply-er who made a "New York Style" sauce, but says "It's probably very different from how a lot of East coast slice joints would do it".
Is that like making a Chicago-style pizza, except it has a thin crust, low-fat white american cheese, and Ragu marinara? :)
 
Curious to know from anyone reading this:

I have always heard the reason NY Pizza is unique is because of the tap water in the area: any thoughts?
 
Curious to know from anyone reading this:

I have always heard the reason NY Pizza is unique is because of the tap water in the area: any thoughts?
My guess is it's more urban legend than anything.
NYC water comes form the Catskills.
NJ pizza tastes a helluva lot like NY pizza, yet New Jersey water comes from New Jersey (aquifers and surface waters - rivers, etc.).
 
Made some pizza tonight with the recipe I posted earlier in the thread... left over breaded eggplant as a topping, sautéed bell pepper in butter turned into an Asiago white sauce and mozzarella. Fried up some extra dough for dessert

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As the weather has taken a turn to the cooler side I'm about to embark on my first dough of the season. I got it down pretty good last year and here's hoping I come up with a good batch.
 
I'm going to re-read the thread. I upgraded the BBQ this past summer, and finally ordered the pizza stone insert for the grill. I've made a few batches so far and I'm kind of liking the crust, although I think I could do better. I did get a better result when the grill was hotter--we both want thin/crispy. I can't handle bread anymore, so this thin-crust recipe has been my go-to so far.

Where I get hung up is transferring the pizza dough from either a heavily-floured and corn-mealed cutting board or parchment paper over to the pizza peel. I have read it can be baked right on the parchment paper also, but I don't really trust it. The corn meal does help at the grill though, so I sprinkle some on the pizza stone and have good results there.

This was for the kiddos. Ham, bacon and pineapple. I'm not usually a fan of this, but I tried a piece and the pineapple nicely picked up some of the BBQ essence. :)

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I'm going to re-read the thread. I upgraded the BBQ this past summer, and finally ordered the pizza stone insert for the grill. I've made a few batches so far and I'm kind of liking the crust, although I think I could do better. I did get a better result when the grill was hotter--we both want thin/crispy. I can't handle bread anymore, so this thin-crust recipe has been my go-to so far.

Where I get hung up is transferring the pizza dough from either a heavily-floured and corn-mealed cutting board or parchment paper over to the pizza peel. I have read it can be baked right on the parchment paper also, but I don't really trust it. The corn meal does help at the grill though, so I sprinkle some on the pizza stone and have good results there.

This was for the kiddos. Ham, bacon and pineapple. I'm not usually a fan of this, but I tried a piece and the pineapple nicely picked up some of the BBQ essence. :)

View attachment 1313616

That's a nice looking pie!

-Dave
 
Last edited:
[QUOTE="Wildcat, post: 12078041, member: 110146"...
Where I get hung up is transferring the pizza dough from either a heavily-floured and corn-mealed cutting board or parchment paper over to the pizza peel. I have read it can be baked right on the parchment paper also, but I don't really trust it. The corn meal does help at the grill though, so I sprinkle some on the pizza stone and have good results there...[/QUOTE]

I don't have any trouble baking right on the parchment paper, but I only set the oven in the kitchen to about 525°. I do trim the excess and the edge gets scorched, but not terribly. I've never had the parchment actually burn.
 
Whole Wheat Thick Crust

I use 1-1/2 wheat flour to 2-1/2 cups bread flower
olive oil
oregano, parsley and basil
1 packet of yeast proofed in warm water with a tad of sugar

I roll it out as square as I can to fit the oven stone
1 hour at 400 before cooking

Garlic first, chopped pepperoni second
cheeses of choice and then swirls of sauce on top
8 minutes on the stone

No recent pic but it's time again to make some.

Great thread that I just saw for the first time. I will be reading thru.
 
Curious to know from anyone reading this:

I have always heard the reason NY Pizza is unique is because of the tap water in the area: any thoughts?

My guess is it's more urban legend than anything.
NYC water comes form the Catskills.
NJ pizza tastes a helluva lot like NY pizza, yet New Jersey water comes from New Jersey (aquifers and surface waters - rivers, etc.).

Back in the day, back when I still lived there, NY tap water won a number of water taste tests. A large measure of that was because the water was from the Catskills. A cousin of mine at one time was owner of a bagel bakery. He ascribed the taste of the bagels in NY to the quality of the water. I have no idea how much effect the taste of the water has on the dough, but some of the water I have tasted in some locations cannot be benign when baking anything.

Shelly_D
 
[QUOTE="Wildcat, post: 12078041, member: 110146"...
Where I get hung up is transferring the pizza dough from either a heavily-floured and corn-mealed cutting board or parchment paper over to the pizza peel. I have read it can be baked right on the parchment paper also, but I don't really trust it. The corn meal does help at the grill though, so I sprinkle some on the pizza stone and have good results there...

I don't have any trouble baking right on the parchment paper, but I only set the oven in the kitchen to about 525°. I do trim the excess and the edge gets scorched, but not terribly. I've never had the parchment actually burn.[/QUOTE]
The pizza dough pulls the heat away from the paper so unless your pizza gets near the flash point of the paper (451 F) it shouldn't burn.
Just try not to leave too much overhang or let it near the flames. Of course if you happen to start a pizza fire you didn't hear this from me:p
 
The pizza dough pulls the heat away from the paper so unless your pizza gets near the flash point of the paper (451 F) it shouldn't burn.
Just try not to leave too much overhang or let it near the flames. Of course if you happen to start a pizza fire you didn't hear this from me:p
I kind of figured that this is what happens, but yeah, the thought of the paper getting charred isn't all that appealing. :D The stone is 14" round, and the pizzas I make I try to keep around 12", so I can at least keep it away from the direct heat. With this pizza stone, having a ring of coals around the perimeter of the kettle works ideally--if they are beneath the stone, the stone overheats and it will burn the crust (and obviously, the paper). The pizza I posted above was put on the stone at around 500°F and came out really nice. The second pizza was in at a lower temperature, so it took a little longer and wasn't quite as crispy. The top of both pizzas was watery, and I'm convinced it was the thicker ham slices I used this time, as I made identical pizzas last time and they were not watery at all. I'm betting it's the ham giving off water as it heats up.

I have no idea how much effect the taste of the water has on the dough, but some of the water I have tasted in some locations cannot be benign when baking anything.
I filter it all, so the water has no odor to it. Normally our Detroit water is quite bad--full of chemicals, reeking of chlorine. I know that with some recipes, having purified water really does make a subtle change so I imagine it does the same with breads.
 
Water has EVERYTHING to do with dough quality. Can’t remember if I mentioned it but there’s a pizza place in Barstow, CA with NYC roots: they have water trucked in from NY weekly. I’m from NY and have eaten there; I knew right away and asked them how they make their dough. They gave me the “professional courtesy tour”.
 
I'm betting it's the ham giving off water as it heats up.
I'm wiling to bet it's the ham too. Whenever i make a hot breakfast sandwich with ham I notice the pool of water that forms on top when I heat it.
I filter it all, so the water has no odor to it. Normally our Detroit water is quite bad--full of chemicals, reeking of chlorine. I know that with some recipes, having purified water really does make a subtle change so I imagine it does the same with breads.
Years back when I met my wife to be our lake Erie got infested by Zebra Mussels. The water reeked so bad we had to get a water filter.
Some years later it's the best tap water we ever had. Those little bottom feeders seem to live off the pollution and have cleaned up the lake really nicely.
I'd hate to taste one of those buggers though...
 
Years back when I met my wife to be our lake Erie got infested by Zebra Mussels.
We still have them here in Lake St. Clair. In fact, they even warn about them, and at least one beach in our city has been closed partly due to them. The problem we have in our lake is that one of the upstream counties from us (which shall remain nameless) is sending raw sewage down the Clinton River whenever there is a storm water basin overflow during heavy rain events. Our county public works commissioner, who was just voted in during our last election cycle, is doing all she can to get this corrected. That sewage has been doing damage to our lake for decades. She's already managed to make improvements in our own county, but convincing others is an uphill battle.
 
@Wildcat: Don’t worry about a little raw sewage. I distinctly remember swimming in the Hudson River as a kid in the 70s not far downstream from the General Electric plant. When we waded through the sludgy bottom to come out of the water we wiped off the thin layer of oily film from our skin. It had an odor that wasn’t exactly a petroleum smell but it was definitely nasty. We did this all the time....I can’t believe no one thought it was unsafe.
 
@Wildcat: Don’t worry about a little raw sewage. I distinctly remember swimming in the Hudson River as a kid in the 70s not far downstream from the General Electric plant. When we waded through the sludgy bottom to come out of the water we wiped off the thin layer of oily film from our skin. It had an odor that wasn’t exactly a petroleum smell but it was definitely nasty. We did this all the time....I can’t believe no one thought it was unsafe.
The same people who told us to stop, drop, and crawl to avoid smoke in a fire were telling us the smoothest cigarettes to buy.
Common sense never has been.
 
@Wildcat: Don’t worry about a little raw sewage. I distinctly remember swimming in the Hudson River as a kid in the 70s not far downstream from the General Electric plant. When we waded through the sludgy bottom to come out of the water we wiped off the thin layer of oily film from our skin. It had an odor that wasn’t exactly a petroleum smell but it was definitely nasty. We did this all the time....I can’t believe no one thought it was unsafe.
Seemingly half of what we did as kids would have killed us! :D Hell, we survived drinking out of the water hose, playing outdoors after dark, riding our bikes in the streets, cooking ants with the magnifying glass and building model cars with all those fumes from the glue!

Our bigger problem is e.coli in the lake. Many of the beaches for several miles either direction of where the river empties into the lake are more often closed than not due to the sewage, and it is also affecting plant and animal life. Yet that "big county to our west" doesn't feel it's enough of a problem and is doing little to rectify it. (They have all the money, too. :rolleyes: )
 
Back to pizza! This is the dough recipe I've used. Given our hectic schedule, making dough ahead of time is not an option--meals are usually decided on at the spur of the moment, and moods often play into that also.

https://www.geniuskitchen.com/recipe/thin-pizza-crust-95048?scaleto=8.0&st=null&mode=us

It's close to what I'm looking for, and it does bake up nice at 400°-500° (depending on what the BBQ is heating up to with the lid on it). Wouldn't mind something a little more airy, but, you really can't get much more airy with a thinner crust.

Kinda bummed though. I found this really nice pizza peel, which has small pits in it to hold flour so the dough can slide right out of it, and raised sides so the pizza can be safely moved around. Nicely made. Yet...I can't use it since it is too wide to fit between the handles of my pizza stone! (The handles on the Weber pizza stone are part of the structure that holds the stone over the opening in the grill.) So, I have two pizza peels now. I figure once it gets really cold and I don't have time to fire up the BBQ in the winter, I can use it with the rectangular pizza stone in the oven.

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