This is our favourite tasting pizza dough. It is a little more involved than the 72 hour dough as it requires a bit of kneading, but it makes a delicious chewy dough and the base cooks really well in the wood fired pizza oven. Again at the last step I prefer to divide it into 200g balls and place in individual containers, brushed with a little oil. I find this dough is a bit firmer and as I haven’t yet mastered the stretching and spinning with my hands, I usually roll these pizza bases out with a rolling pin.
Ingredients
1kg Italian double zero flour (feel free to experiment with other types of flour)
600ml water
1 packet of instant yeast
25g salt
Method
Mix about a quarter of the flour, three quarters of the water and all the yeast together for a thick, soupy batter (also known as a poolish). Let it sit a couple of hours or even overnight. The longer it rests, the more of a sourdough flavour will develop.
Knead in the rest of the flour, water and all the salt. Keep kneading for about 10 minutes. Shape the dough into a ball, cover, and let it rest for about 30 minutes.
Knead again for a few minutes, shape into a ball, cover, and let it rest another 30 minutes.
Repeat once last time, but let the dough rest for as long as possible, at least a few hours or until it’s approximately double in size.
Next, turn the dough out onto a floured surface and divide into eight portions. Shape the portions into balls and place on a couple of floured baking trays or on the kitchen counter, leaving plenty of space around each ball. Cover and let rest one last time, again until doubled in size.
Your pizza dough is done! Try and stretch open the balls of dough with your hands for the authentic Italian puffy crust; otherwise gently roll it out with a rolling pin. You can also leave the dough balls in their round shape and bake delicious rolls or roosterkoeke.
Remember to put a generous sprinkle of semolina on your pizza board to stop the base sticking!
