re: What's your best homemade pizza recipe

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On page 5, you'll see fightintigers made his own steel and uses it for other things.

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I was wondering if someone could make their own. my dad does some metal work, may see if I could work with him to make one.

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It also reheats pizza so that crust is so crisp, so even if I have leftovers or I order from a pizza joint, I preheat the steel and put the pizza or a few slices in for about 4 minutes on bake, not broil, and it works like a charm.

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awesome. looking forward to getting one

My Peter Reinhart crust from this week. It was thin, very crisp and awesome.

Nice

I made mine last night. Used the Peter Reinhart recipe as well. Didn't think about taking a picture, but it wouldn't have been as pretty as yours. I ended up using too much sauce and I cooked it on my top rack. The sauce saturated the crust and the inner crust didn't get crisp. So for my next try I'll use less sauce and cook it in the bottom rack. However it still tasted really good. Just used pepperoni, mozzarella, and banana peppers for toppings. I used the sauce method you recommended on the first page using San Marzano tomatoes, which turned out really well. Made it the day before along with the pizza dough to give some time for the spices to soak in. I also used a baking stone, hoping to have a baking steel to use by my next try.

Definitely looking forward to trying again.

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But if you want to geek out on pizza styles, long fermented dough, and all matters pizza, get Gemignani's newish Pizza Bible.

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Here's his recipe for Napoletana Dough:

NAPOLETANA DOUGH

MAKES 28 OUNCES (795 GRAMS) DOUGH, ENOUGH FOR THREE 9 TO 10-OUNCE BALLS

An authentic Napoletana pizza has to be made with Italian doppio zero (double zero) flour. Double zero is a designation that indicates the fineness of the grind, with the scale going from 2, the coarsest, to 00, the finest. Double-zero flour is milled from soft wheat, which has less elastic gluten than hard wheat. The result is a tender dough that requires a light touch and a gentle hand when you’re working with it. Caputo and San Felice are the two revered double-zero brands for Neapolitan pizza. I always tell my students they’re like the Coke and Pepsi of Naples, and I recommend both. Caputo is easier to find in American supermarkets. I prefer to use fresh yeast in this dough, because it’s the traditional Neapolitan way.

The only difference between my wood-fired and my home-oven Napoletana dough is that I add a bit of malt to the home-oven version to help with browning. With the intense heat of a wood-fired oven, there’s no need for malt.

7 grams fresh yeast, broken into small pieces or 2.3 grams (¾ teaspoon) active dry yeast
70 grams (¼ cup plus 1 tablespoon) warm water (80°F to 85°F)
453 grams (3¾ cups) 00 flour, preferably Caputo or San Felice, plus more for kneading as needed
10 grams (1 tablespoon plus ¼ teaspoon) diastatic malt if baking in a home oven
210 grams (¾ cup plus 2 tablespoons) ice water
90 grams Poolish (recipe below)
10 grams (2 teaspoons) fine sea salt

Put the yeast in a small bowl, add the warm water, and whisk vigorously for 30 seconds. The yeast should dissolve in the water and the mixture should foam. If it doesn't and the yeast granules float, the yeast is “dead” and should be discarded. Begin again with a fresh amount of yeast and water.

Combine the flour and malt (if using) in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the dough hook. With the mixer running on the lowest speed, pour in most of the ice water, reserving about 2 tablespoons, followed by the yeast-water mixture.

Pour the reserved water into the yeast bowl, swirl it around to dislodge any bits of yeast stuck to the bowl, and add to the mixer. Mix for about 15 seconds, stop the mixer, and add the poolish.

Continue to mix the dough at the lowest speed for about 1 minute, until most of the dough comes together around the hook. Stop the mixer. Use your fingers to pull away any dough clinging to the hook, and scrape the sides and bottom of the bowl with a bowl scraper or rubber spatula.

Add the salt and mix on the lowest speed for 1 minute to combine. Stop the mixer, pull the dough off the hook, and continue to mix the dough on the lowest speed for about 1 minute. The dough won’t look completely smooth, but if you rub some between your fingers, you should not feel any undissolved salt. If you do, continue to mix for another minute.

Using the bowl scraper, transfer the dough to an unfloured work surface, then knead it for 2 to 3 minutes, until smooth. If the dough is too sticky to knead, sprinkle it with just enough flour to allow you to work with it. Cover the dough with a damp dish towel and let it rest at room temperature for about 20 minutes.

Use your dough cutter to loosen the dough and to cut it into thirds. Weigh each piece, adjusting the quantity of dough as necessary to give you equal weights of 9 ounces (255 grams) each. You may have a little extra dough.

Form the dough into balls. Set the balls on a half sheet pan, spacing them about 3 inches apart. Or, if you will be baking the balls on different days, place one on a quarter sheet pan and the other two on a second quarter sheet pan, spacing them 3 inches apart. Wrap the pan(s) airtight with a double layer of plastic wrap, sealing the wrap well under pan(s). Put the pan(s) in a level spot in the refrigerator and refrigerate for 36 to 48 hours. If the dough will be baked in a home oven, it is best to refrigerate it for the full 48 hours.

POOLISH

MAKES 90 GRAMS

0.12 gram (one-third of 1/8 teaspoon) active dry yeast or 0.36 gram fresh yeast, broken into small pieces
47 grams (3 tablespoons plus 1 teaspoon) cold tap water
47 grams (¼ cup plus 2 tablespoons) flour used in dough recipe

Put the yeast in a small bowl, add the water, and whisk vigorously for 30 seconds. The mixture should bubble on top. If it doesn’t and the yeast granules float, the yeast is “dead” and should be discarded. Begin again with a fresh amount of yeast and water.

Add the flour and stir well with a rubber spatula to combine. The consistency will be quite thick, resembling a thick pancake batter.

Scrape down the sides of the bowl, cover the bowl with plastic wrap, and let sit at room temperature for 18 hours. Refrigerate for 30 minutes to cool slightly before using.

If you are not using the starter right away, you can store it in the refrigerator, though I suggest keeping it for no more than 8 hours. Bring to cool room temperature before using.

Made two more pizza's with the Reinhart dough Sunday night. Less sauce and putting it on the bottom rack of my oven were the tricks needed to make them a lot better than my first try on Saturday. The crusts were thin, crisp, and really good. Figured out about 5 tablespoons of sauce was the ideal amount. Now I have three more balls of this dough in the freezer to work with at some point.

First pizza had pepperoni, green peppers, and mozzarella.



Second pizza had sausage, bacon, banana peppers, green peppers, and mozzarella.

Luckily I have a brother-in-law who has a friend with a fabrication business. My BIL gave friend 4 ducks he shot in trade for a 3/8" thick piece of steel. My wife made a white chocolate bread pudding for her brother. I got the steel. Makes fantastic pizza and didn't cost $100.

All the tips here are great. I use the Reinhart recipe for dough with all purpose flour. 3 days cold ferment in fridge. Get some Artisan dough proofing trays to make life easier.

Tried Tipo 00 dough and really loved it, but it does need malt or honey to brown up in 550 F oven.

Good job!

As weird as I've gotten was a white clam pizza topped with arugula. It was very good.