A little while back, someone mentioned that Alton Brown made his pizza dough by letting it rise for 24 hours in the fridge.
Anyway, I’m about 18 hours into such a thing. (and I checked it this morning and it’s rising nicely)
Question: do you let the pizza dough sit out for a while before cooking to let it get to room temperature?
Or does it not make a difference?
Have you even tried it both ways?
Thanks.
It should get back close to room temp. before you stretch it out to pizza size. Otherwise, I have found that it rips rather than stretches.
Damn! I’ve tried it seven or eight times and mine never rose at all.
Yeah, I think it was your thread that made me think about it.
I didn’t have time to make it today, so I thought I’d do the “24 hours in a fridge” thing. So far, so good.
Thanks, silenus. . .I’ll make sure to take it out a bit early.
bluethree - You never got it to work? Can you go through step by step what you’re doing?
StG
Interesting question. I decided that I wanted to make my own pizza dough the other day and looked up a recipe on Food Network web site. What I found out is that no one agrees on how long it should rise. 1 hour, 2 hours. Finally I just picked a recipe and followed it to the letter including the temperature of the watter that is added to the yeast (I have an instant read thermometer). hotter than 110-115 farenheit will kill the yeast. But too cold and it won’t activate the yeast. Has to be right around 110 to make the magic happen.
But I’m pretty sure that it won’t stretch out like you want it to unless it’s room temperature.
That was my first ever attempt at making my own pizza dough and it was fantastically successful.
I think I may have to make pizza again this weekend.
I think going through it step-by-step would be a bit tiresome, but I can tell you that once I determined that I wanted to make awesome pizza at home, I read a thread where several people agreed that Alton Brown pizza dough was awesome, so I determined to make it. To that end I spent $200 on a stand mixer, $20-some dollars ordering the episode of Good Eats, and about $2.60 on unglazed quarry tiles for my oven.
I have watched the video, read the transcript, tracked down the right kind of yeast (I assume) and flour, and I still get non-rising dough. It doesn’t help any that he never specifies a temperature, he just says, “Warm, not hot.” Even on the video where he answers questions sent in by viewers, he does not address the issue of the water temperature.
Damn, I even went so far as to determine the temperature of my refrigerator. If I remember right, it is 42 degrees F.
Let the yeast activate in the warm water (100-110 F) for about 10 minutes before adding to the dry ingredients. If it doesn’t smell good and yeasty at that time then your yeast is the problem.
I assume his method on the show is the same as in his book I’m Just Here for More Food. If so, then you’re supposed to let the dough proof for an hour after coming out of the frig. You are letting it rise for about an hour or until doubled before putting it in the frig, too, aren’t you?
Nope. He mentions this nowhere. Plus he specifically says that it only rises about one and half times, not double. And the instant yeast that he specifies is supposed to be added with dry ingredients and kept away from wet ingredients until mixed.
easiest way to never have dead yeast is to start it first. a little liquid and some kind of sugar. it will be visibly foaming when you mix wit ingredients. workhs for bread and beer.
i couldn’t tell you if pre-pitching the yeast will prevent making uber-bread, but it will rise.
I’m a little amused that this is a yeasty question, only because in my undercaffeineated state I misread the thread title as “Pizza douche question.”
There’s a nice image. (I think Old Dutch had a natural with their Salt & Vinegar Douche, but when they expanded to Sour Cream & Onion and the rest, it got a little weird.)
I use this dough recipe from Nick Stellino, but I do the mixing in a bread machine on the dough setting. Activating the yeast in warm water with a bit of sugar is important, to make sure you have live buggies in there. If the yeast mixture doesn’t look like the top of a cappuccino after 10 minutes, try again.
Hell, after I make the dough and let it rise, I chop it into blobs and freeze them in individual bags. A day on the counter and they perk right back up (i.e.: puff up a bit and bubble, they won’t double in size again.) Hell, even if you don’t get good rise, it’ll still be better than frozen pizza.
Other Annie pizza tips:
-roll it out, save the hand tossing to the professionals
-don’t freak if it’s not perfectly round. Most of my pizzas look like Australia.
-Most canned sauces are too sweet. Try mixing tomato paste with water until you get a desired consistency, then mix in some dry oregano.
-precook the veggie toppings a bit before assembly. The home oven doesn’t get as hot as a commercial pizza oven-your tiles will bake the crust but the topside may need some help.
-I can’t use the pizza peel with any reliability, so after I roll out the dough to required size I place it on a sheet of parchment paper. Once pizza assembled, you can pick up the parchment gently by either side, and plunk the whole thing on the stone. As long as the pizza doesn’t burn, it won’t stick. Discard parch. before slicing.
-preheat that oven with the stone in for at least half an hour at 500 deg. Give that stone time to heat up.
-top pizza with pesto sauce, thinly sliced onion and drained ricotta (in that order). Then invite me over 
Change your frig setting to not as cold.