Wednesday, October 10, 2007

Pizza Dough

This recipe is adapted from How to Bake, by Nick Malgieri.

1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour
1 cup unbleached all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup warm water (110 degree F)
2 1/2 teaspoons yeast (1 package)

Whisk together the water and yeast. Set aside. Sift together the flours and the salt and make a well in the center. Add the water/yeast mixture and stir together to make a nice, sticky dough. Beat it for about a minute and cover the bowl with plastic wrap. Let rise until doubled, which usually takes about an hour. Sprinkle cornmeal on a pizza peel, drop your pizza dough onto the cornmeal, and shape your dough, stretching and patting. You're ready to make pizza!

I heat my oven as high as it will go (550 degrees F) with my baking stone in it, for at least a half hour before baking my pizza. Something else I like to do is to just throw the ingredients into my bread machine and let it work my dough in the morning, then I remove it and put it into the refrigerator to rise the whole day. The dough develops a really great flavor when allowed to rise for an extended, slow period.