Authentic Napoletana Pizza Dough Food

NEAPOLITAN PIZZA

Steps:

• Make the dough: Combine the warm water and yeast in a small bowl, stirring to dissolve the yeast. Combine the flour and salt in a medium bowl. Add the yeast mixture to the flour and stir to make a shaggy dough. (The dough should be tacky. If it feels too wet and sticky, add flour, 1 tablespoon at a time; if it's too stiff, add a little water.) Transfer to a lightly oiled surface and knead until smooth and elastic, about 3 minutes. Place an inverted bowl over the dough and let rise slightly, 30 minutes. Divide the dough into 4 pieces and form each into a ball; arrange 3 inches apart on a lightly oiled baking sheet. Rub the tops of the dough lightly with olive oil and cover the baking sheet with plastic wrap. Refrigerate overnight.
• Remove the dough from the refrigerator about 2 hours before baking; let sit, covered, until ready to use. One hour before baking, put a pizza stone or inverted baking sheet on the middle oven rack and preheat to 500 degrees F (or 550 degrees F if your oven goes that high).
• Make the sauce: Combine the tomatoes and their juices with 1 teaspoon salt in a blender; blend until smooth.
• Generously sprinkle a pizza peel or an inverted baking sheet with cornmeal. Place 1 ball of dough upside down on the cornmeal using floured hands. Gently pull the dough into an 8- to 10-inch circle, reflouring your hands as needed and being careful not to deflate the dough. Spread about 1/4 cup tomato sauce on the crust; top with one-quarter of the mozzarella. Drizzle with 1 to 2 teaspoons olive oil and season with salt.
• Slide the pizza onto the hot stone and bake until the crust is dark golden brown and the cheese is bubbling, 7 to 9 minutes. Transfer to a cutting board and sprinkle with basil. Let cool 2 minutes before slicing. Repeat to make 3 more pizzas.

AUTHENTIC ITALIAN PIZZA DOUGH RECIPE

Steps:

• To prepare the dough for the pizza, start pouring the flour in a large mixer bowl.
• In a small bowl add luke-warm water and then add the yeast, mixing gently until the yeast is dissolved.
• Turn the mixer on with the hook mounted on medium-to-low speed and start pouring the water little by little, making sure you wait for the previous dose to be absorbed by the flour.
• Keep kneading until the dough gets smooth and homogeneous. When it gets to that point, keep kneading for about 15/20 minutes.
• Add the salt and keep the mixer running until the salt is fully combined with the dough.
• When the salt is fully absorbed, remove the dough from the mixer and knead with your hands until you get a large ball.
• Place it in a large bowl, cover with foil or a clean humid cloth, then let it rise in the oven with the light on.
• Wait until the mixture has at least doubled in volume (after 1.5 h). Ideally, you should let it triple in size (at least 3 hours).
• Once the dough has risen, transfer it on a work surface.
• Divide it into 4 equal parts and shape them as balls using your hands. Once done, cover them with a clean cloth and let them stand for 30 minutes at room temperature, before using them to make your pizzas.

AUTHENTIC ITALIAN PIZZA DOUGH

Steps:

• How to make homemade pizza dough
• Place 600 g Tipo 00 flour in a large mixing bowl. Tipo 00 flour has a much higher protein content than our conventional all-purpose flour. We have had good experiences with the Tipo 00 flour "Farina Speciale Per Pizza" and the original Caputo Farina 00. If you do not have tipo 00 flour at home all-purpose flour can be used.
• Provide 2.5 cups (600 ml) of lukewarm water in a measuring cup.
• Add 3 - 5 g brewer's yeast and 30 g salt and stir well with the water in the measuring cup. Alternatively, fresh baker's yeast can be used. In traditional Neapolitan recipes, very little yeast is generally used to obtain a finer taste.
• Pour the water-yeast salt mixture into the mixing bowl and combine with the flour to a dough. For this it is enough to stir with a fork.
• Cover the dough with a damp kitchen towel and leave for 20 to 30 minutes. This step is very important for a good pizza dough. In the resting period of the dough, first protein chains are formed.
• After the resting period, stir the dough for about 3 minutes with a kitchen mixer with dough hook at the lowest level. If desired, add 2 tablespoons of olive oil. According to "Pasta per la pizza numero 328" the dough should be kneaded by hand, but this may also be due to the age of the recipe. Stirred with a kitchen mixer, the dough is in our experience much smoother. However, the mixer should have at least 350 watts of power. Alternatively, of course, a food processor or a Thermomix can be used to stir the dough.
• Gradually add the remaining 400g of flour and continue stirring at the lowest level. The process should take about 5 minutes.
• When all the flour has been absorbed by the dough, stir once more for 2 minutes. This time, however, on the second level of the kitchen mixer.
• Divide the dough into two portions of 800 g and form one ball each. Place the dough balls in two floured mixing bowls and cover with a damp kitchen towel.
• Let the dough rest
• Let the dough rest in a warm room for at least 6 hours. Even better are 24 hours.
• After the resting time use the dough immediatelly or store cool and dark. For example in the refrigerator.
• If necessary, take out 270 g of dough per pizza. The dough should be removed from the refrigerator 1 to 2 hours before the intended preparation.
• Shape the Pizza dough
• Put flour on a clean work surface. Form the now room warm dough into a ball and press it flat. Form with your hands into a round and thin dough. When doing so, place flour under the dough and press it from the inside to the outside.
• If the dough has a reasonably round shape, it can be lifted up the edge and turned like a steering wheel. By its own weight, the dough pulls almost by itself. By the way, a rolling pin should by no means be used to roll it out, since it takes away the airiness of the dough and the pizza does not rise well in the oven.
• The dough should now be about 12.5 inch (32 cm) in diameter and be very thin. Put plenty of flour on a pizza board or a pizza shovel and pull the dough on top.
• When everything is done correctly, you now have a very large and thin and perfect round pizza. Now it just has to be topped with the desired ingredients.
• Top the homemade Pizza
• As base topping homemade tomato sauce is used. Ideally, the tomato sauce is made from sun-ripened Italian San Marzano tomatoes or at least Roma tomatoes. In Naples, only San Marzano tomatoes from the Agro Nocerino Sarnese growing region are used.
• Spread the tomato sauce evenly with a tablespoon and leave an edge of about 2 centimeters wide. The other ingredients can be chosen freely to taste.
• At the example of the classic Margherita from Naples, it is only topped with the tomato sauce, mozzarella fior di latte or buffalo mozzarella and fresh basil leaves.
• How to bake Pizza
• Position the rack in the center of the oven. For the best baking result a pizza stone is needed. Place the stone on the rack and preheat the oven to 570 degrees Fahrenheit (300 degrees Celsius). If the oven supports only lower temperatures use the highest temperature available and use the bake mode setting. Her you can find a deatiled guide for baking pizza at home.
• When the oven has reached the temperature, bake the pizza on the stone for about 5 to 8 minutes. How long it takes to bake depends on your oven and the preheating time. If you use lower temperature or much toppings the baking time increases.

NAPOLETANA PIZZA DOUGH

Steps:

• Mix yeast with 1/2 C of lukewarm water and let it proof. This usually takes 5-15 minutes.
• Place all ingredients including the remaining lukewarm water (1 1/4 C plus 2 T) according to the ABM machine instruction and set it for dough only. My ABM takes 2 hours for dough only setting.
• After the 2 hours are up take out the dough and place it in a well olive oiled large bowl. Turn the dough to coat it with the oil, and cover the bowl with plastic wrap and put the bowl in the refrigerator overnight. The overnight method makes wonderful tasting pizzas.
• Next day remove the bowl of dough from the refrigerator 2 hours before you plan to make the pizzas. The dough will have expanded and gluten very relaxed.
• Using wet hands gently transfer the dough to a floured counter, trying not to degas the dough as little as possible.
• Using a pastry blade or knife dipped in water, divide the dough into 6 equal pieces. Gently round each piece into a ball and brush or rub each ball with the olive oil.
• Brush the sheet pan with olive oil and place each dough ball on the pan and loosely cover the pan with plastic wrap. (If you do not plan to use all the pieces, place the extra ones in individual freezer bags and freeze).
• Allow the dough balls to sit at room temperature 2 hours before making the pizzas.
• Preheat the oven to 500°F.
• Roll out the each dough into 9 to 12 inch diameter pizzas using a rolling pin and your hands. This dough is very soft, elastic and hard to handle compared to other pizza doughs and will require some effort to get to 9 inches diameter. I use combination patting down, stretching, and use of rolling pin to get it to 9 inch diameter. Once you get very good handling this dough, you may get it to 12 inch diameter, but 9 inch is perfectly fine.
• Lightly oil the pizza baking pan and place the pizza. Spread 1/4 C to 1/2 C sauce over the surface of dough, leaving a 1/4 to 1/2 inch border uncovered. Arrange mozzarella over the top and sprinkle with grated Parmesan or Romano cheese.
• Bake for about 9-10 minutes in the middle rack. When done, the crust should be puffy and slightly charred on the edge and thinner in the center, and cheese fully melted and just beginning to brown in spots. The underside of the crust should be brown and crisp, not white and soft. Keep an eye on it until you know how long your oven will take because each oven is different.
• Remove the pizza from the oven and lay 4 - 6 basil leaves. Repeat with the remaining ingredients to make the next pizza.