Beats Tossing Your Cookies

I just remembered why I use a Cuisinart for processing dough. I spent ten minutes kneading a glob of pizza dough. It makes one yearn for the intellectual stimulation of ironing. No wonder homemade bread disappeared in the Fifties.

I made two batches of dough. Both will be tossed, but only one was kneaded. Actually, I made four batches. But I'm so absent-minded, I drifted off and put two in the Cuisinart instead of kneading them, and I had to throw them out.

Not sure how hand-tossing works. Mike does it. As I understand it, you make a disk with a thick center, and you yank it and squeeze it until it resembles a pizza. We shall see.

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This is a bummer. I just made the first of two pizzas, with machine-kneaded dough and a hand-tossed crust. There is no question; hand-tossing beats rolling. I was afraid of this, because obviously, a roller is likely to mash the CO2 out of a blob of dough. The tossed crust is lighter and has a better texture. It's not a giant difference, but it's big enough to make it worth it to learn how to toss dough.

The big problem with tossing dough, apart from the mess, is that it takes skill, and it's very easy to destroy your pie. Maybe the answer is to make extra dough as a backup. Also, I get the impression that tossed dough should be slightly drier than rolled dough, because if the dough is too soft, it's easier to rip. I had to put my dough down and pull it on a floured surface because I was getting nervous about the integrity. But it was very stretchy and would have passed "the window test" with flying colors. I know that because one area got so thin I could see through it.

I took a couple of photos. Before I get around to posting them I have to cook the second pie.

Photos

Here is the first pie. It was machine-kneaded and hand-tossed.

Second pizza. Hand-kneaded and tossed.

The second pie was somewhat better, but that may just be because I did a better job of tossing it. I tried to make a nice lip that would pump up, and I succeeded. I don't think hand kneading makes any difference, but if you want to be sure you're getting the best results, go ahead and do it. Or do your own side-by-side test.

I've also come to realize that you have to be brave with the damn salt. Even I am somewhat brainwashed about the evils of salt, so I have a hard time making myself use enough. Adding salt to my sauce really improved it, as did increasing the water and sugar. I think that when you're trying to copy street-corner pizzerias, you should try to think the way their owners do, and these guys are cheap. So it should be no surprise that they use a lot of water and sugar.

Here is my current sauce recipe, for a 14" pie:

4 oz. Super Dolce pizza sauce
1/4 teaspoon garlic powder
2 tbsp. olive oil
1 1/2 teaspoons sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
4 oz. water
1/2 - 1 teaspoon dry oregano

You can't use that much water with Bonta or Full Red sauce. Super Dolce is very thick.

I'll give you the dough recipe I used, but I'm not sure I recommend it. I like to play around with ingredients. If I were you, I'd probably use low-gluten flour and no added gluten.

1 1/2 cups high-gluten flour
1 cup self-rising flour
1 tbsp. gluten
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. pepper
1 tsp. sugar

For the yeast:

6 oz. water, a little warm
1 tbsp. dry yeast
1 tsp. sugar

Usually I like low-gluten flour, but sometimes I like the moist, friendly, chewy texture of high-gluten flour and I jack it up with extra gluten. The self-rising flour was just for fun, but it does seem to improve things.

Seems like pizza with a lot of gluten gets limp pretty quickly as it cools. I think gluten makes pizza hold water.

I think real sticklers will want Grande cheese. My Gordon Food Supply cheese is good, but Grande is the standard.

Here's how I tossed the dough, after some brief web research. If you let your dough rish in a covered dish, as I do, it will come out shaped like a beret. You flour it and hold it in one hand and use the other to pinch out a rim around the edge. Keep turning and pulling the rim out, pulling dough outward from the outer edge of the central mass. When it gets big enough, put both fists under it and give it little tosses by twisting your wrists. You want to make it turn as it jumps. Pull it outward a little with each toss. In about thirty seconds, you'll end up with a disk about a foot wide. After that, you may want to drop it on a floured surface and finish it there, so you won't risk tearing it. Be careful about letting it stick to itself. If it folds even briefly and there is not enough flour on it, it will stick to itself like a folded piece of tape.

My second crust was pretty easy to toss, and it came out in a very nice circle, so it's not rocket science.

I baked these right on the stone, at 550, for seven minutes. I think 600 might be better, but 550 is very good. I used semolina on the peel to keep the pies from sticking. I put them together on the peel and slid them onto the stone. I generally use a screen.

Because the hand-tossed crusts blow up more in the oven, you can probably reduce the dough recipe by about a third. My pies were a little thick. You should use all 8 ounces of sauce, and you'll need about 12 ounces (weight) of cheese. Sprinkle the pie with oregano before you put it in the oven. This is surprisingly important.

Fool around with it and see what happens.