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Pizza!

I’m also going to try my hand at some New York style, and New Haven style. Half the fun is experimenting. Even when the final product doesn’t achieve the desired result, it’s still pizza, and pizza is good for the soul.
 
I spent much of the last year exploring pan pizzas and foccacia, mainly because I like them and the style fits pretty well with my summer oven (Wisco 421). I was looking forward to cool temps so I could crank up the inside oven again. Since fall I've been playing with thinner crust hearth pizzas and exploring the whole minimalist thing. Now that we're in another year I'm starting to think about what gets planted in the gardens, and what kinds of pizza I want to make next.

One thing I have to accommodate with the Wisco is that the heat ratios between the top and underside favour a thin pizza and tend to leave pan pies a little underdone on the bottom. I addressed that to some extent by par-baking the crust and then topping it and returning it to the oven, but it wasn't ideal.

I tried putting a baking steel in the Wisco, but the rack arrangement won't take the mass of the plate plus pan of pizza. However! I will drop by the scrap yard and get a hunk of 1/8 steel and try that. If that works I should be able to launch hearth pizzas into the Wisco.

Our home oven maxes out at 525F. Putting a large chunk of 1/4" steel plate in there and letting it soak for 45 minutes does a reasonable job on a hearth pizza. It'll be interesting to see how the changes for the other oven work out, later this year.

O.H.
0.8 pizza stone for 1 hour @480 but doing 3 pies after the other brings it to the limit.
 

Old Hippie

Somewhere between 61 and dead
Presented for your amusement and edification: "Regina Style:"


Hmmm. I never really thought of Canada as the pizza powerhouse of North America, but alongside the story about the home economist who introduced "pee-ZAIR-ee-ahs" to Canada in 1957 I ran across the factoid this morning that the beloved (!) "Hawai'ian" pizza was developed by a Greek pizzaiolo in Canada who was trying to capture the flavours of Chinese food.

"Cultural Mosaic" for sure.

O.H.
 

Old Hippie

Somewhere between 61 and dead
I'm gonna throw a couple sausage pies tonight for Ground Hog Day.

One with Mrs. Hippie's Fresh Pork sausage, the other with my Moroccan Mutton sausage with cashews and chilis.

O.H.
 
Presented for your amusement and edification: "Regina Style:"


Hmmm. I never really thought of Canada as the pizza powerhouse of North America, but alongside the story about the home economist who introduced "pee-ZAIR-ee-ahs" to Canada in 1957 I ran across the factoid this morning that the beloved (!) "Hawai'ian" pizza was developed by a Greek pizzaiolo in Canada who was trying to capture the flavours of Chinese food.

"Cultural Mosaic" for sure.

O.H.
Yes, I have lived there a few times over the years and it is stupendous. Saskatoon has some good ones too. Calgary unfortunately has only a very few.
 

Old Hippie

Somewhere between 61 and dead
I've always enjoyed it, to the point of going to incredible lengths to create a Canadian-bacon-flavoured meat alternative so I could get my fix back when I was eating a plant-based diet. Mrs. Hippie, who sometimes tires of my occasional obsessive searches for orthodoxy, suggested that if I wanted a damn pineapple pizza I should just have one and quit whining. So I did.

Ultimately I find Oscar Wilde's advice very useful. The easiest way to deal with a temptation is to give in to it.

O.H.
 
Same Spiel as the last few times (Thincrust; whole rye sourdough starter, 00 wheat, 24 hours cold fermentation) - excellent result!

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860B8583-D10B-49DE-A89F-0D4948FD40D9.jpeg
 

Old Hippie

Somewhere between 61 and dead
Same Spiel as the last few times (Thincrust; whole rye sourdough starter, 00 wheat, 24 hours cold fermentation) - excellent result!

Beauty!

OK, you're pushing me toward sourdough crust! That's a good thing. I made sourdough crusts years ago but man, talk about heavy. Now that I know a lot more about bread (and bake at least twice a week with sourdough) it's time to explore. My rye culture is booming at the moment; I've been making knackebrod and deli rye loaves. Hmm. Just got some new mozz today. Pizza sometime this weekend for sure.

O.H.
 
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