Passionate About Pizza: Making Great Homemade Pizza (8 page)

Baking Stone

A baking stone is a circle or rectangle made of unglazed ceramic material about one-half of an inch thick. You generally place the baking stone in the oven with the oven turned on about an hour before baking the pizza so that the stone can heat up to oven temperature. Typically, rectangular pizza stones are approximately fourteen inches by sixteen inches and circular stones are sixteen inches in diameter, but there are many variations available.

The high heat and porous surface of the baking stone simulates a bakery or pizzeria oven and this allows you to duplicate pizzeria pizza crust in your home oven. You slide the item you want to bake directly onto the baking stone using a
pizza peel
; this is a long-handled wooden board. See the section entitled “Pizza Peel Technique” (on
page 73
) to learn how to properly use a peel.

I started out using unglazed quarry tiles from the tile store, but soon gave them up and purchased a stone specifically made for baking. Although they worked well I was worried that tiles not made specifically for baking might emit harmful chemicals. You can find baking stones in many stores that carry cooking supplies. You can also find them for about half the retail price at cooking supply outlets.

Dough Docker

A dough docker is a common tool for a commercial pizza chef, but you rarely find one in a home kitchen unless someone specifically seeks out one. A dough docker is a handled roller that has little tines sticking out of the roller. By rolling the dough docker over the surface of the dough, the tines prick the dough. This holds together the top and bottom surfaces of the dough (and sometimes it makes holes in the dough) in order to keep the dough very thin and crispy as the pizza bakes. You might remember that some crackers have little holes in their surface; the dough docker uses the same technique. A dough docker is one of the secrets to making a Cracker Crust pizza. If that is your favorite style of pizza, you will want to get one of these for your pizza kitchen.

Alternatively, you can use the tines of a fork. I used a fork successfully for years!

Electric Mixers, Bread Machines, and Food Processors

Electric mixers and food processors that can mix and knead dough are now widely available. Feel free to use whatever one you have, but do not go and buy one just because you want to start making pizza. You can also use bread machines to mix and knead the dough; just remove it from the machine after it is mixed or risen. On some machines, the timer can allow you to have the dough kneaded and raised just when you want it!

These devices can save you time and fuss. I strongly suggest, however, that you mix and knead a few batches of dough by hand to become familiar with the process as well as the
feel
of the dough as you or the machine kneads and mixes it. That way, you will be better able to make any minor adjustments to the procedure if the dough does not come out of the machine just the way you want it to.

After becoming familiar with the hand kneading process, start using your mixer by following the manufacturer’s instructions to mix and knead a batch of dough. I recommend that you use your experience of mixing and kneading by hand to adapt the manufacturer’s instructions to suit your particular tastes. However, do be careful to heed any safety advice from the manufacturer.

I use a heavy-duty Kitchen-Aid® mixer for most of my pizza making, but I still make dough by hand every now and then just for the feel and fun of it. I follow the same basic steps described in the recipes in this book whether I make the dough by hand or use the KitchenAid®. I have found that using the Kitchen-Aid® mixer is not really much faster than mixing and kneading by hand. Rather, it is just a little easier and a little less messy.

Very wet pizza dough is tough to handle by hand and is not much better when using the Kitchen-Aid® mixer. The Magic Mill® Mixer is adept at handling wet dough. It uses a very slow speed along with a roller and scraper that more closely resembles the hand-kneading process. They are somewhat less common but you can find one with perseverance. I use mine for making big batches of dough and dough with high moisture content.

Pizza Board

You may wonder what a pizza board is and why I would mention it. Well, I have a large wooden cutting board that is about 16 inches by 20 inches; I call it my pizza board. I knead dough on it, let dough rest on it, and shape pizzas on it. Amazingly enough, the board really helps me contain my mess in the kitchen and save on cleanup time. Since all my work with dough is contained to the pizza board, I only have to clean up the board. I use a dough scraper to scrape the flour and bits of dried dough from the surface of the board into the sink or garbage can. Because it is a wooden cutting board, I do not have to be too careful or too particular with the surface. A pizza board is not a necessity but I have found it to be very useful.

You can use any large, wooden cutting board that has a flat surface. It can even be the back of a carving board! Marketing names for these items may be breadboards, pasta boards, or other clever names. Some of them have a lip or hook on one edge that helps keep them in place on the table or counter.

Pan Lifter

This little gem is the key to maneuvering heavy or hot (or both!) pizza pans without scorching your fingers. There are several different types of lifters. Just make sure you get one that grabs you or fits your pan the best. Some pizza pans come in sets with pan lifters; a perfect match!

Pizza cutters come in a variety of styles. I use the classic metal rolling cutter most often. I have used mezzaluna (half-moon shaped) knives to cut pizza. There are also the big chopper knives that have a long, heavy, curved blade; you usually use two hands to cut across the whole pizza in one motion. My mother used kitchen scissors to cut the pizza she made when I was growing up.

Pizza Cutters

Wheeled pizza cutters with a 4-inch diameter wheel and a curved handle seem to work best for most people. However, you can certainly do reasonably well with any cutter you have. Pick your favorite weapon, but try not to cut yourself!

Pizza Pans

You can find an enormous number of different pizza pans on the market. Since I have not used them all, I cannot give definitive opinions on those that are better or worse. One notable difference between pans is the size of the lip. Pans for thick style pizza generally have 3/4” or 1" high