DB's October Challenge - Pizza and Toppings

This month's challenge, hosted by sweet Rosa of Yummy Yums. She chose an easy pizza recipe from Peter Reinhart's “The Bread Baker's Apprentice”. I was so excited when I found out about this month's challenge... It's perfect!!!! Currently, the place I worked for is a pizza place. Hence, I asked the supervisor if I could use their kitchen for my challenge. She approved and I was so excited.. Of course, I used the recipe provided, bought some ingredients for the toppings and did all on my own.

For this challenge, I wanted to make one dessert pizza (blueberry) and one white pizza (caesar dressing). I used their toppings for the rest of the dough. There is one interesting rule for this challenge. The challenge was to use the tossing method. I thought that I will never be able to make it or my dough will never turn out well. At first, I thought of just skip the tossing method but decided to go for it. It was a little hard at first but from the second toss onwards, I got the hang of it and I was like never wanted to stop and my dear sister who helped to snap the picture, had a hard time to snap when I tossed the dough.. LOL... Oh man, my pizza dough turned out great!

Here, Im trying to toss my dough..

Here are the photo of the pizzas:

Blueberry pizza. Unfortunately, my friend bought the wrong type. He got the blueberry with light syrup instead of the blueberry pie fillings.. But this is as good as the blueberry pie fillings.

I added some feta cheese on top of the blueberry. This one is caesar dressing with turkey ham, sweet pineapple, italian sausages, turkey bacon and cheese with sweet chilli sauce.... this is really good!!!

For the remaining dough, here are some photos................

This is vegetarian pizza: tomatoes, pineapples, black olives, green peppers, feta, mozzarella with pesto sauce as the based. My sun-dried tomatoes got burnt, should have put them before the cheese. :(

This pizza is a mixed of black olives, mushrooms, chicken chunks,pineapples, green peppers, bbq sauce, mozzarella and cheddar cheese with yogurt based.

EQUIPMENT: Stand mixer with paddle and dough hook attachments (optional, see recipe), cooking thermometer, baking sheet, parchment paper, cooking oil, plastic wrap, pizza peel/scraper, pizza stone or pan.

RECIPE SOURCE: “The Bread Baker's Apprentice: Mastering The Art of Extraordinary Bread” by Peter Reinhart. Ten Speed Press, Berkeley, CA. Copyright 2001. ISBN-10: 1-58008-268-8, ISBN-13: 978-158008-268-6.


~ BASIC PIZZA DOUGH ~
Original recipe taken from “The Bread Baker’s Apprentice” by Peter Reinhart.
Makes 6 pizza crusts (about 9-12 inches).

Ingredients:
4 1/2 Cups (607.5 g) Unbleached high-gluten (%14) bread flour or all purpose flour, chilled
1 3/4 Tsp Salt
1 Tsp Instant yeast
1/4 Cup (60g) Olive oil or vegetable oil (both optional, but it’s better with)
1 3/4 Cups (420g or 420ml) Water, ice cold (40° F/4.5° C)
1 Tb sugar
Semolina/durum flour or cornmeal for dusting ( I omit this out)

Method:
DAY ONE
1. Mix together the flour, salt and instant yeast in a big bowl (or in the bowl of your stand mixer).

2. Add the oil, sugar and cold water and mix well (with the help of a large wooden spoon or with the paddle attachment, on low speed) in order to form a sticky ball of dough. On a clean surface, knead for about 5-7 minutes, until the dough is smooth and the ingredients are homogeneously distributed. If it is too wet, add a little flour (not too much, though) and if it is too dry add 1 or 2 teaspoons extra water.

NOTE: If you are using an electric mixer, switch to the dough hook and mix on medium speed for the same amount of time.The dough should clear the sides of the bowl but stick to the bottom of the bowl. If the dough is too wet, sprinkle in a little more flour, so that it clears the sides. If, on the contrary, it clears the bottom of the bowl, dribble in a teaspoon or two of cold water.The finished dough should be springy, elastic, and sticky, not just tacky, and register 50°-55° F/10°-13° C.

3. Flour a work surface or counter. Line a jelly pan with baking paper/parchment. Lightly oil the paper.

4. With the help of a metal or plastic dough scraper, cut the dough into 6 equal pieces (or larger if you want to make larger pizzas).

NOTE: To avoid the dough from sticking to the scraper, dip the scraper into water between cuts.

5. Sprinkle some flour over the dough. Make sure your hands are dry and then flour them. Gently round each piece into a ball.

NOTE: If the dough sticks to your hands, then dip your hands into the flour again.

6. Transfer the dough balls to the lined jelly pan and mist them generously with spray oil. Slip the pan into plastic bag or enclose in plastic food wrap.

7. Put the pan into the refrigerator and let the dough rest overnight or for up to thee days.

NOTE: You can store the dough balls in a zippered freezer bag if you want to save some of the dough for any future baking. In that case, pour some oil(a few tablespooons only) in a medium bowl and dip each dough ball into the oil, so that it is completely covered in oil. Then put each ball into a separate bag. Store the bags in the freezer for no longer than 3 months. The day before you plan to make pizza, remember to transfer the dough balls from the freezer to the refrigerator.

DAY TWO
8. On the day you plan to eat pizza, exactly 2 hours before you make it, remove the desired number of dough balls from the refrigerator. Dust the counter with flour and spray lightly with oil. Place the dough balls on a floured surface and sprinkle them with flour. Dust your hands with flour and delicately press the dough into disks about 1/2 inch/1.3 cm thick and 5 inches/12.7 cm in diameter. Sprinkle with flour and mist with oil. Loosely cover the dough rounds with plastic wrap and then allow to rest for 2 hours.

9. At least 45 minutes before making the pizza, place a baking stone on the lower third of the oven. Preheat the oven as hot as possible (500° F/260° C).

NOTE: If you do not have a baking stone, then use the back of a jelly pan. Do not preheat the pan.

10. Generously sprinkle the back of a jelly pan with semolina/durum flour or cornmeal. Flour your hands (palms, backs and knuckles). Take 1 piece of dough by lifting it with a pastry scraper. Lay the dough across your fists in a very delicate way and carefully stretch it by bouncing it in a circular motion on your hands, and by giving it a little stretch with each bounce. Once the dough has expanded outward, move to a full toss.

11. When the dough has the shape you want (about 9-12 inches/23-30 cm in diameter - for a 6 ounces/180g piece of dough), place it on the back of the jelly pan, making sure there is enough semolina/durum flour or cornmeal to allow it to slide and not stick to the pan. (I used vegetable oil so that the dough doesnt stick to the pan)

12. Lightly top it with sweet or savory toppings of your choice.

NOTE ON SAUCE: Your sauce (any) should not be too thick as it will thicken in the hot oven. Less is more but make the less truly more by using quality ingredients.

13. Slide the garnished pizza onto the stone in the oven or bake directly on the jelly pan. Close the door and bake for abour 5-8 minutes.

14. Take the pizza out of the oven and transfer it to a cutting board or your plate. In order to allow the cheese to set a little, wait 3-5 minutes before slicing or serving.

Thank you to the supervisor, Yaz for letting me use kitchen and some of their ingredients for the pizza....

Thanks to this wonderful challenge, I think they were the best pizzas I ever made.. ;)

I hope everyone had a wonderful time making October's challenge as much as I did! :)