Pizza Pizza

A new crust recipe...too much hydration (for the crust) and a new flour. Perhaps too much new for on meal. The dough was made Monday evening in anticipation of a Tuesday meal. It rose a LOT in the fridge. Shoulda been the first clue. I could not get it to flatten out well. One of the crusts had its share of holes.  Topped with burger on one and chicken pesto on the other, both made relatively good pizzas but....not great. 

I found a whole wheat, cooks like white,  flour with a high fiber content at WalMart. I used the bulk of that flour. Perhaps it was too much and should have been mixed 50/50 with regular flour? I don't know but my family will suffer though many experiments now!  Also I added too much water and the dough was more like a very thick batter than a dough. I have been experimenting with hydrated doughs so wet that they can't be kneaded in a conventional fashion. The Prosphora I made for church on the 30th was like this and it came out rather well so I pushed the envelope a bit. I like my breads dense and a little moist (apparently so does everyone else at church judging from the comments) rather than dry or dry and fluffy. The loaves are a little on the heavy side ( not rocks,  but they have weight to them) so I can tell there is still a fair amount of water. As always, I use a thermometer to get to over 200 degrees less it be gummy in the center (an altar server's nightmare).

Brenda ordered me a new toy for Father's day. A Lodge Cast Iron Pizza pan. Can't wait to try it out. It can be used on the grill or replace one of my faithful oven stones (by now looking very dark from oil and spills).  Speaking of stones, mine have never cracked even though I left them in the oven during the cleaning cycle once (a LOT of smoke) and they reverted to their original selves, clean and sparkly. (I don't recommend this as I mean a LOT of smoke) It did not take them long to regain their crusty appearance but I never take them out of the oven.