Cooking Pizzas - NickAger/pizzaoven GitHub Wiki

Manna from Devon

Physics of baking good pizza

Some choice comments:

The authors received useful advice from a friendly pizzaiolo who was working in a local Roman pizzeria, frequently visited by them when they lived in that neighbourhood: "Always come for a pizza either before 8 p.m. or after 10 p.m., when the pizzeria is half- empty.”" The reason for this advice was very simple – oven capacity. As the pizzaiolo explained, 325 - 330°C1 is the optimal temperature for Roman pizza baked in a wood burning oven with a fire- brick bottom. In this case, a thin Roman pizza will be done in 2 minutes. Thus, even putting two pizzas into the oven, the pizzaiolo can serve 50-60 clients within an hour. During peak hours, about one hundred customers frequent the pizzeria and at least ten clients are waiting for a take-out pizza. To meet the demand, the pizzaiolo increases the temperature in the oven up to 390°C, and pizzas “fly out” of the oven every 50 seconds (hence, each one requires a “baking time” of around 11⁄2 minutes). However, their quality is not the same: the bottom and the crust are a little “overdone” (slightly black), and the tomatoes are a little undercooked.

Don't "Moat" your pizza. The barren expanse of dried sauce and over-sized crust is the classic sign of "moating" the pizza. Spread the majority of the toppings as close to the edge as you'd like your crust to be, and reduce the amount of toppings (cheese, sauce, etc.) at the center. As the pizza cooks, the crust will rise, and the toppings will naturally flow to the center of the pie.

Anyway, to your list -- if toppings are flowing at all, you've got too many toppings. You definitely do want high protein flour - at least 12%, or higher if you can find it. When I lived in the UK this meant imported Canadian flour as the domestic product simply couldn't do it.

They also import Manitoba flour in Italy to make pizza. High gluten is a must or it will just fall apart if it is the right thickness / cooked correctly. 90 seconds is faster than usual, but yes it is cooked fast. Neapolitan in Italy means thicker crust than other regions, but you are probably right that is what you are eating. Outside of Italy I am not sure many people would be able to recognize the difference.

Never, ever, ever use cheap mozzarella. Especially if you are doing a sauce-less pizza.

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