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The Physics of baking good Pizza (2018)

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Re: The Physics of baking good Pizza (2018)

#92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> My Ooni experience has been very bad Sorry to hear that, but maybe you can still work at it. > at the back it's 900, at the front 600. This is after an hour of warm-up. I think that it will be as hot as it is going to get, after about 30 mins. I get a touch over 500c at the back corner (maybe 950F) and a bit over 300C (600F) at the front lip. This should be right, with a centre at 350 to 400C > rolling pin, or hand…

> Do you use the same peel to launch and to extract? Typically this is not recommended as the extraction can make that peel hot and moist, which would affect the next launch. Launch off wood or aluminium. Extract with aluminium or other metal peel. Alternatively, scrub the peel with cornmeal between launch and next pizza.

> Alternatively, scrub the peel with cornmeal between launch and next pizza

You would have to make do like that if you only have one peel, but in general you'll be better off with separate Launch, turning and extraction peels. They do different jobs and so have different designs.

The turning peel is typically quite different to the other two, but as mentioned, you'll do better with 2 different ones for launch and extraction. Wood is great for launch, terrible for extraction - you can't keep it in a hot oven for any length of time. And a metal peel that has warmed up during doming and extraction would be worse for the next launch.

Also, the launch peel can be prepped for the next launch by someone else, while the current pizza is cooking.

Re: The Physics of baking good Pizza (2018)

#93
post #90
post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> gluten formation, rolling pin, or hand-stretch, food mixer. For my ingredients listed above: First, I put the yeast in the water to soak and get soft, sometimes for 1+ hours. Right before combining with the flour, add salt to the water and yeast and mix. There are rumors that if had the salt in the water and yeast for 1+ hours, the salt would kill the yeast. Then add ~2/3rds of the four to the water, yeast, and sal…

Like just put a round ball of dough and press it ? I might try it, shaping the dough into round shape is my least favourite part > There are rumors that if had the salt in the water and yeast for 1+ hours, the salt would kill the yeast. As much as I have researched that it's that some level of salt would do that but level below that would just slow the yeast down. I'd be more worried with 1h+ in water it would just n…

This calls out for the Triangle Test! Two the same, one different, and you have to pick the outlier.

Re: The Physics of baking good Pizza (2018)

#94
post #90
post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> gluten formation, rolling pin, or hand-stretch, food mixer. For my ingredients listed above: First, I put the yeast in the water to soak and get soft, sometimes for 1+ hours. Right before combining with the flour, add salt to the water and yeast and mix. There are rumors that if had the salt in the water and yeast for 1+ hours, the salt would kill the yeast. Then add ~2/3rds of the four to the water, yeast, and sal…

Like just put a round ball of dough and press it ? I might try it, shaping the dough into round shape is my least favourite part > There are rumors that if had the salt in the water and yeast for 1+ hours, the salt would kill the yeast. As much as I have researched that it's that some level of salt would do that but level below that would just slow the yeast down. I'd be more worried with 1h+ in water it would just n…

> I might have not discerning enough taste but I honestly can't tell between 1 day or 2 day dough

I do sourdough, so I use a levain not a dry yeast, but I have done many 2-day doughs (48 hours rest in the fridge) and many 1-day doughs (24 hours in the fridge), and yes, I can easily tell the difference, and I prefer the 2-day dough, and will always do that timeline when schedule permits.

Serious eats reached similar conclusions: https://www.seriouseats.com/the-pizza-lab-how-long-should-i-...

NB thier "day 1" is same day: "Each day (including the first before it went in the fridge), I pulled out a 6-ounce chunk of it... and baked it"

So what I call a "two-day dough" with about 48 hours in the fridge, is what they call "day 3", which isn't wrong: Thursday, Friday, Saturday are 3 days; Thursday afternoon to to Saturday afternoon is 2 days. Dough made on Thursday rests for 2 days before Saturday, and Saturday is the third day.

I agree with them on the dough that rested 24 hours or less though - "tight, small-holed structure ... The flavor of the crumb was ... one dimensional". It is spongy and bready. Not bad, just bland.

Re: The Physics of baking good Pizza (2018)

#95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Still, somebody needs to prototype a 44 Watt steel slab to cook pizzas with. This is Hacker News, after all. :)

44 watts is not enough. I would say 1100 minimum to cook a good pizza.

If I were reading this on The Right Tools for The Right Job News, I'd agree. :)

Re: The Physics of baking good Pizza (2018)

#96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And then someone needs to port Doom to it.

Would the pizza dough on the bottom be considered as the display? ;)

I'm thinking pellets of cheese as the pixels, with a frame rate of one frame about every three minutes.

Re: The Physics of baking good Pizza (2018)

#97
post #19

The paper recommends against baking pizza on steel because this would cook the pizza too fast, but this is only true at the temperatures of pizza-specific ovens (paper says 620F / 325C). If you're trying to cook a pizza at home in an oven that only goes up to 550F / 290C the steel helps a lot to make up for the oven not being quite hot enough. (I use a pizza stone, though, mostly because that's what I already have)

After some experimentation, I ended up doing pizza on a stone that sits atop a steel on my gas grill, with another stone suspended above to reflect heat back down. I find that the steel’s conductivity keeps the stone nice and hot while reducing thermal loss when I place the dough, while the stone provides “softer” more even heat to the pizza to prevent scorching.

Does the steel under the stone actually do anything? I think of the advantage of steel as getting things to equilibrium faster, but your stone should already be at equilibrium.

Re: The Physics of baking good Pizza (2018)

#98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Do you use the same peel to launch and to extract? Typically this is not recommended as the extraction can make that peel hot and moist, which would affect the next launch. Launch off wood or aluminium. Extract with aluminium or other metal peel. Alternatively, scrub the peel with cornmeal between launch and next pizza.

> Alternatively, scrub the peel with cornmeal between launch and next pizza You would have to make do like that if you only have one peel, but in general you'll be better off with separate Launch, turning and extraction peels. They do different jobs and so have different designs. The turning peel is typically quite different to the other two, but as mentioned, you'll do better with 2 different ones for launch and ext…

Absolutely, I have a separate turner. All good points, but it can be done without. Generally my flow once things get going is:

1) clean launcher (scrub with cornmeal to remove sauce burned cheese etc) (15 seconds)

2) heavily flour the launcher with fresh cornmeal and kneed flat a single pizza dough (1 min)

3) build pizza with toppings (30 seconds)

4) launch, watch for flare ups (pull pizza away from flare ups and let burn out before pushing back forward), turn as cheese browns until all surface cooked (1-2 min)

5) take out pizza and set aside for slicing, use launcher to push forward cornmeal from last launch to force a burn out (15 seconds)

6) go to step 1

3-4 oven minutes / pizza or 15-20 pizzas / hr / oven

Most expensive part is the real mozzarella cheese which is outrageously expensive in the US. In France its 1/4 the price. I think I may make mozzarella in the near future, it looks like the easiest of cheeses.

Re: The Physics of baking good Pizza (2018)

#99
post #43
post #24

There are some great videos on youtube about how people hack their oven's auto clean mode in order to get the temperature up for the purposes of making a killer pizza. The auto clean, blasts the oven at a high temperature, but when it's engaged it locks the door so you can't open it. People rig the toggle so that they can get the higher temperature and still be able to open the oven to put the pizza in. This lets fol…

I'd love to do that. It's also too bad that you can't manually engage the lock as a safety feature.

You definitely can manually set the lock at least on most ovens I’ve seen in the UK and Europe, it’s sometimes not obvious but they do have a “child lock” just like most electric cooking hobs.

Re: The Physics of baking good Pizza (2018)

#100
post #58
post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had no part in any of that. But here's another song you probably won't like: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S9WWz95ripA

I don't have any "psrt" in any of that either. It's just that I like those things, a lot. I like music a LOT, and that Italian music is some of what I like the most. A lot of what I included is opera, and I can't sing. But here is some Italian violin music I like a lot: https://youtu.be/kS-W3lfcVvY The girl is pretty, but she is also quite good on violin and especially in this famous Vivaldi music. In my first effort…

Wait until you find out about arancini
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