| Texture: |  (3.5 / 5) |
| Presentation: | (2.5 / 5) |
| Taste: | (3.5 / 5) |
The first hurdle I found was actually where to start. There’s recipes for everything and the amount of variation on pizza dough, is quite frankly – stifling! A normal person’s automatic reaction might be to opt for the well renowned and popular Neapolitan pizza base, however, I have a personal animosity towards it. Why?! Because near enough every pizzeria or Italian restaurant out there claims to make the ‘best’ or ‘true’ Neapolitan pizza dough and I am almost positive that there must be a better pizza out there. Blasphemy to the masters of the pizza world perhaps, but my search will include visiting the widest range of pizzerias, serving all types of pizza (with me potentially stealing a recipe or too) and working through all the internet recipe search has to offer.
So, for my first attempt at ‘dough-ing it myself’, I opted for my trusty friend, the BBC Good Food Website’s ‘basic white dough’. Start easy I say. Usually I’m pretty useless with sticking to recipes, as I’m so easily bored and like to experiment, however, with baking we all know precision is everything. So I took a trip down to TESCO and bought everything on the list:
Recipe One: BBC Food’s Basic White Pizza Dough
Ingredients
- 650g/1lb 5oz Italian 00 flour (strong white flour)
- 7g sachet of easy-blend yeast
- 2 tsp salt
- 25ml/1fl oz olive oil
- 50ml/2fl oz warm milk
- 325ml/11fl oz warm water
Ingredients for Attempt 1
‘00’ flour is different in touch, colour and smell alone – you can almost sense it’s going to taste good, even before mixed and baked. I know what you’re thinking – isn’t ‘00’ flour mandatory in Neapolitan pizza making. I’m almost surprised that the recipe didn’t call for water at PH7. I won’t lie, I’m not overly happy with following the crowd but BBC Good Food has yet to fail me, and once I’ve mastered the ‘basic white dough’, I can perhaps detour away from this 00 affiliation with Naples.
Bringing Pete to life
Wow! Pizza making is actually quite fun! I was under the misconception that you’d have to knead the dough for ages and was pre-justifying it by thinking I’d develop some pretty good definition in my arms but no, in reality – the recipe only asks you to knead for 5 minutes. Easy peasy, so I went for a lucky two extra. You then leave the dough to prove for 1.5 hours and give it some more love (I gave this time four minutes – wanted to balance it out 😉 ) I took Pete – the dough across London with me to my friend’s house to eat, getting some pretty funny looks on the way and marvelled at how much of a difference heat makes to the proving process. When it was by a radiator, it grew but as soon as it was out in the bitter January air, it withered.
Stretching the dough was the most challenging. It is definitely NOT as easy as it looks. These chefs or pizzaolis definitely do not give away how hard it is! You’re not meant to use a rolling pin apparently, but using your fingers seems to be ridiculously far-fetched. I ended up with holes, an uneven dough and it was in no way a circle (pictures will show). So, this side of things definitely needs work.
Moving on to something a little more exciting – the taste! I’ve divided into different categories: colour, texture, chew and taste. Oh, and a picture:
Colour
- 2/5 Beige/light brown – no charred bits like you’d get in a proper pizzeria. This would probably due to the oven not being hot enough. Next time, will use a hotter pizza stone.
Texture
- 4/5 Soft, doughy and crispy around the edges. To me, this is actually the type of texture I enjoy the most. Slightly American in its thickness and softness, it was generally just very enjoyable to eat.
Chew
- 2/5 There wasn’t much of a chew, but if stretched properly and cooked at the appropriate level, then it’d probably have had more of one.
Taste
- 4/5 – I actually really enjoyed it. I don’t like to be cocky, and it may have been helped by the four glasses of champagne I’d already consumed but to me, it was pretty delicious.
Verdict?
For a first timer, not at all bad! I’d recommend this recipe but I think I’ll try it again with a hotter pizza stone, and spend a little longer stretching the dough. And maybe without the champagne next time.
