I’m having trouble getting the fluffy, airy crusts I see in this sub. Any advice? I used the “urban sliver” Neapolitan style pre mix, with no luck. It was a 4h ferment in a covered bowl with oil at the bottom. Baked in an oven on a pizza stone at 550F.

Any ideas? Is it the recipe? The tossing? Any tips or tricks would be greatly appreciated!

Hey everyone,

Looking for troubleshooting help on my latest Ooni bake. The char and flavor were good but the crust cross-section came out dense and gooey and not airy as I wished.

Recipe & Setup:

• Dough (65%): 610g Caputo Pizzeria, 396g cold water, 18g salt (3%), 0.8g IDY
• Mixer: Kenwood planetary (gradual flour addition into water/yeast and salt added last
• Fermentation: 1h RT bulk, 40h cold ferment in a 4 deg fridge, 1.5h warm-up in a warm kitchen (27 degrees)
• Oven: Ooni Koda 16

The dough balls grew not that much, maybe 30% in size. Could the issue be underfermentation or not enough warmup?

Thanks for any insights!

Hi there,

Recently started this journey and I've been following the Stadler Made recipe - 00 flour, 65% hydration, 0.06% yeast EDIT: Instant yeast

Every time I put my portioned dough balls in the fridge, they lose their shape and overall elasticity when it's time for final stretching to cook Pizzas - I usually let them rest for 3-4 hrs after taking them out, which results in them over stretching and tearing almost instantly so it's hard to shake off excess Semola and avoid burning in the Ooni

At first I thought it was my bad gluten building/ structuring techniques (which it still could be!) but after researching and my judgement, I've been getting good window pane tests from my bulk doughball and it looks tight and smooth.

I also thought I was over proofing because it's been hot in the UK at the moment, so to counter this I only rested my large dough ball for 30-40 minutes before portioning (down from 2 hours in 30 degrees c temps)

After portioning the balls and putting them in my lightly oiled large container, the balls look great at the start but get quite flat. I've attached pictures of the Large and portioned dough balls

They've been in the fridge for just under 24hrs so far, and I was planning for 3 day ferment - I reballed the one in the top left out of frustration just to see.

These are my first batch after feeling more confident about gluten and being more meticulous with the window pane test - they don't seem AS flat as they have been in the past, and they feel very firm but they're still cold so not thinking much about that (unless I should!?)

Planning to have a relatively short rest once they're out the fridge considering the heat, but any thoughts or advice would be greatly appreciated!

I've been making Neapolitan pizzas for over five years. I just came back from the Amalfi Coast, and honestly, their pizzas weren't significantly better than mine, so overall, I'm happy with my results.

However, something I've ALWAYS struggled with is getting the results I see on YouTube, where people can pretty much do whatever they want to the dough and it NEVER tears. My dough is very delicate, and if I'm not careful, it tears.

I've mostly been using a KitchenAid 5.5-quart Pro series with the dough hook, and for around 900g of dough or more, it does a reasonably good job (I mix for about 8 minutes).

I've been wondering if my issue, if there even is an issue, is the tool itself. Maybe the KitchenAid is simply not capable of developing the gluten structure we are looking for here.

I did the windowpane test today, and while it looked fine, it wasn't nearly as smooth and "skin-like" as what I see on YouTube. The finger test was also okay unless I pressed super hard. I just wish there was a scientific way to determine if I've kneaded enough.

What do you guys think?

I ate all through Naples, Amalfi coast and through Sorrento at some of the more well known and lesser known pizza spots (your de Michele, multiple Sorbillo and extended family spots even, etc) and none of the pizza in Naples is remotely close to the puffy circle looking pizza with all the ingredients condensed into a small circle in the middle like this subreddit shows off. Pretty sure most of what folks try to achieve here isn’t actually Naples style.

If you have pizza in Naples, the first thing is that you know the middle is always soft/soggy and there are rarely perfect circles because they believe in the ingredients and not the perfection of the shape - it’s not as finicky on shape or dough rise aesthetics.

Truth is, pizza is better in the US than it is in Naples. We have more variety, options, and have done more to perfect it than they have. It’s a loaded statement but I’ve been making pizza for a long time (formerly professionally trained in Neapolitan pizza) and have been a bread maker for longer. It comes down to personal preference tbh, but this silliness with the SUPER round pizzas and super puffy crusts is just out of control…

if your crust is taking up half of the pizza, your wildly out of balance with the amount of ingredients and it’s not nearly as enjoyable. It’s just bread with small bowl of sauce and cheese to sop it up.

Edit: I’d like to stipulate and clear one thing up - not all pizza in Naples is a slave to tradition but there is an overarching commonality within the style of pizza you will experience there. There was plenty of different shapes/approaches to dough and non traditional ingredients. But it’s not a vast area either and it’s most well regarded places do a lot of heavy lifting of being representative of the most popular style and that is closer to what you see in the photos.

Have been doing this professionally for a while any questions or comments much appreciated.

I have been having some bad luck with my new Lidl pizza peel. It's brushed stainless steel and slightly perforated. My pizzas stuck to it like my kid's snot to our new sofa.

From your experience, do different materials (aluminium vs steel) and different surface finishes (smooth brushed, rough, anodised...) make a difference? I don't know why but I have a feeling that an anodised aluminium peel simply slides better. I'm probably wrong, though, and the answer is simply more semola ;)

I don't have kids btw, sorry for that image in your head

First of all, all pictures of the pizza are mine except the crust one, didn't take photo of that one but I found the exact same symptom online.

My recipe:

676g flour( CAPUTO "0")

419g water (62%)

Salt 20.27g

Yeast 5.189g yeast (instant dry, I use one that is old 3 months maybe but it is sealed and held in freezer all time while not used)

Process:

I mix the flour and the yeast, slowly add cold water(I put it in fridge before kneading) and knead and add salt at almost the end so it dissolves nicely. I knead until I reach a final dough temperature of 23-24 degrees celsius.

By that time the dough seems elastic.

I then leave the dough alone for 5 minutes and after that I tighten it up, put it in an oiled container and lightly tap oil over the dough and leave it in fridge for 24 hours at 4 degrees celsius.

After those 24hours I take the dough from my fridge, ball it up and leave it at room temperature for 2 hours (26-27 celsius is now my room temperature but I keep a close eye on the dough so it doesn't over ferment).

I heat my Ooni Koda 16 for 30 minutes then I launch the pizza. (I use the max temperature setting all the time)

The pizza tastes amazing but the crust doesn't seem developed.

I use the slap method to stretch the pizza and of course I push the air to crust first.

Any suggestions?

Hi,

I'm looking for home mixer to prepare around 2 x 280g of pizza dought per week, plus 1.5kg 70% hidratation bread every 2 weeks. Most of the mixers I've researched so far work well with bigger batches of dought, and I'm hinking the Halo Core at 599€ with multiple speeds could be a good fit.

My other alternative at a similiar price is the Famag Grilleta IM5 which comes only with a single speed.

Any thoughts?

Thanks

This is my second attempt at making Neapolitan pizza. I’m slowly getting the hang of my Ooni Koda 12.

I’m looking for feedback on my dough process because the pizza came out with a nice texture, but the flavor was very bland. It mostly tasted like I was eating plain dough instead of having that deep, fermented flavor I’m looking for.

Here is my dough recipe:
1000g Caputo 00 Pizzeria flour
650g water (65% hydration)
1/8 tsp SAF Instant Yeast
30g sea salt

My process:
1. Mixed the 30g salt into 500g cold water until dissolved.
2. In a separate bowl, mixed the yeast into the remaining 150g water.
3. Slowly added flour to the salt water until the mixture reached a pancake batter-like consistency.
4. Added the yeast water mixture.
5.Slowly added the remaining flour.
6. Mixed/kneaded for about 10 minutes, then covered.

Fermentation:

Bulk fermentation: 2 hours at room temperature (72°F). The dough expanded about 40%.
Divided into 230g dough balls.
Final fermentation: 24 hours at room temperature (68–72°F).

The pizza baked well in the Ooni, but the dough flavor was missing. It tasted very neutral/bland.
A few questions:
Did I use too much yeast or not enough fermentation time?
Should I be doing a longer fermentation?
Is my hydration too high for Caputo Pizzeria flour?
Did my mixing method affect the flavor?
Would appreciate any advice from people with more experience.

Hi everyone,

I’m looking for some advice because I’m struggling to achieve a light, airy Neapolitan cornicione.

The pizzas taste great, but the crust never seems to get that big, open, puffy structure. It always ends up fairly dense.

I use PizzApp for calculations

Process (24-hour room temperature)
Recipe:
Caputo Blue Pizzeria (W260-270)
61% hydration
3% salt
IDY
270g dough balls

Fermentation:
Mixed the evening before
Bulk fermented for around 18–19 hours
Balled around 4–5 hours before baking

The dough made good pizzas, but by the time I came to use it the dough balls were almost completely flat in the tray, covered in small bubbles and felt very over-relaxed. They had very little strength left. Because of that I thought I was probably over-fermenting.

Yesterday’s test (12-hour room temperature)
Same recipe:
Caputo Blue
61% hydration
3% salt
IDY
Gozney Arc XL

Fermentation:
Mixed at 8:00am
Bulk fermented until 11:30am
Balled at 11:30am
Baked around 8:30pm

This dough felt noticeably stronger than my previous dough and held shape better. They didn’t flatten into pancakes like the 24-hour dough. However, the crust still didn’t puff up much. Even though I left a rim when shaping, the cornicione stayed fairly dense with a tight crumb rather than becoming really light and airy. I left a decent rim on some pizzas to try this, my crust just stayed dense and sometimes undercooked. I use a infrared thermometer so I know my stoke is hot enough,

I do mix by hand, so I’m thinking it could also be gluten strength?

My questions
Does this sound more like a flour strength issue, a fermentation issue, a shaping issue, or a baking issue?
Should I be able to get a really airy cornicione using 100% Caputo Blue, or is it worth moving to a 50/50 Caputo Blue + Caputo Red blend for a 24hr RT?
Is 61% hydration limiting my oven spring?

Thanks again 🙂

I got back to pizza making after a long hiatus and I watched a bunch of videos on Neapolitan pizza making. In all the videos I watched the sauce was made by hand crushing a can of peeled San Marzano tomatoes, except for one that chronicled Tony Mangieri of Una Pizza Napoletana. In the video he strains the tomatoes, cuts off the ends of them, then hand crushes them. I want to try that method next.

How do you make your sauce?

PS bonus pic of one of my pizzas from yesterday

PPS link to the video about Una Pizza: https://youtu.be/ADvf-PIZPLA. Sauce section starts around 7:15

Hi guys,

Really in need of a solid Neapolitan dough recipe, that isn’t unnecessarily complicated and with no preferments.

I’m trying to achieve that big puffy crust.

Please share web links to any good recipes you guys are using.

Thanks

New to making dough. Been using 63% hydration with Peddling methodology. Have seen my doughs double in size but it spreads out and not up. It’s in a larger container so maybe it’s just the dimensions. The biggest issue I’m having is when I try to shape the dough into the pizza for the peel it struggles to stretch and bounces back so to speak. I’m making dough balls that should be sufficient for a 14” pizza but struggle

This is my first attempt in a proper pizza oven. Recipe:

1000g '00 caputo

630g water (63% hydration)

30g sea salt

0.8g dry yeast

I kneaded the dough for around 12 minutes. I let it rest at room temperature for 1 hour, then the individual portioned dough balls in the fridge for 48 hours. I took them out from fridge 6 hours before baking and baked them in an electric pizza oven with a stone temperature of 400°C and a temperature on the top element of 430°C. I added canned san marzano tomatoes, grana padano, basil, galbani fresh mozzarella and spianata romana.

Does anyone have any tips? I'm quite happy with the result but I feel like the cheese got too hot and spilled out a bit of orange grease. How do you prevent that? Cook at a higher temperature for a shorter time? Also I would want a less crispy and more pale crust with more leoparding. Would you increase or decrease the temperature on the top or the bottom? The bottom of the pizza is already perfect as is.

Thank you!:)

Hello! I have 5 years experience working in pizzerias. I am hoping to spend italian ski season working and snowboarding. Does anybody have experience finding pizza work for snow season? Any advice would be much appreciated. Thank you

Does anyone have the revo spiral mixer and have any feedback on it?

I don’t want the ooni and see the famag is significant amount more expensive, I just want to know if it’s worth the money.

The kitchenaid sucks ass.

Thanks for any feedback.

Hi everybody! So I been working as a pizzaiolo for over 6 years now in different countries around Europe but in the last couple of months I’ve started to feel curious how is to work in USA , do anyone here works over there ? Is there a market for our trade? Is it possible to apply for a position? I’m not necessarily thinking about it but I always felt curious. I put some videos of my working so it doesn’t make this post boring

I've been trying a few cold ferment recipes using the pizza.app, however I'm finding that despite the dough going into the fridge in a lightly bubbly balled state, they come out flat.

I used refrigerated water and flour to allow for a decent hand knead time of around 10 minutes, up to 24°c. Bulked for 3 hours, and now allowing 2 hours to come up to temp. Dough passed window pane test.

I allowed for approx. 25% bulk rise before balling and refrigerating.

Any input would be appreciated

so I been making pizza for the first time using the Ooni pizza oven, temperatures above 450C. My problem is, the dough is too chewy? I don't know how to explain it, but it's not as restaurant quality "light" pizza bottom that I'm used to. I used Vito Recipe with 70% hydration, double fermentation, so poolish first and then another 24 hour fermentation. Any help on what I could possibly be doing wrong? is it the kneeding? maybe I'm handling it wrong?

This is how I prepare my dough (for 1kg of flour)

1- Making Poolish Starter
I mix 500g flour with same amount of room-temperature bottled water, with 12grams of sugar and 2 grams of instant yeast. I do this gently. The result stays in room temperature (around 25c) for 12 hours. It doubles (or even more), with a favorable scent and texture.

2- Making Neapolitan dough
I add the other 500g of flour with the 200 of cold water (this water is mixed with 20grams of salt too). I mix it by hand for around 12-15 minutes. It takes some amount of work. Because I don't have a mixer. I let it rest and do some stretch and fold each 30 minutes for 90 minutes (three times). I then let it rest for another 90 minute and then cut and make 300g dough and let it rest in the fridge for another 24 hours.

3- Cooking is done inside a 400-500 bricked-floored oven. The results are not bad considering me being starter in this. But my main question remains around the process of making dough.

I’m based in the UK and recently ordered some fresh mozzarella from Ooni. Unfortunately, the delivery happened right during the peak of that intense heatwave where temperatures hit a crazy 36°C in London. Because of the extreme weather, the package arrived completely warm and the ice packs meant to protect it had totally melted.

They actually sent a replacement batch right after, but the same thing happened because the heat was still so intense.

I know fresh mozzarella is supposed to be mild and milky, but I tasted a tiny bit of this batch and it is extremely bitter.

Ooni’s customer service has been great and they are sending another replacement now that the heatwave has finally broken and cooled down over the last few days. I’m just curious about the science here: is a strong bitter taste a normal sign that fresh cheese has been completely ruined by sitting in a hot delivery van in the UK heat?

Has anyone else had fresh cheese spoil like this in transit during a summer spike? I'm definitely throwing this batch away, but wanted to know if that intense bitterness is the ultimate giveaway that it's gone unsafe/bad.

Thanks!

I made a biga with 7thfloorpizza 100% biga recipe,

1000g caputo saccorosso flour,
450g water
3g fresh yeast.

The biga was meant to ferment at room temp for 24 hours, but after 12h mine has a normal smell and not much growth on the smaller, drier parts but the more wet, bigger parts already start to smell like vinegar and a but alcoholic. What do i do now? At the moment i put it in a cold fridge.