140/18 – Margherita Pizza:
I have been trying quite a few different pizzas on my Ooni Pro lately: Greek Pizza, Shakshuka Pizza, Burger Pizza and a Hot Dog Pizza. It was time to go back to basics with Margherita Pizza.
The Book:
The dough and sauce recipe is from The Pizza Bible Book:
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Ooni Blog:
My new Ooni Blog is now live on this site with all of my notes on there. It’s split out into categories so should be a lot easier to use now. Will be easier for me to update too:
THE INGREDIENTS:
Flour: Molino Grassi 00 flour
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Yeast: Saf-Levure Dry yeast
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Tomatoes: San Marzano Plum Tomatoes
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THE KIT:
6 litre food grade container with lid: I use this to bulk ferment the dough once it’s mixed
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Food grade pizza dough trays (x3): I use these to cold proof the dough balls
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Wooden Pizza Peel: Stops your pizza sticking when you launch it into the oven, needs minimal flour also. I wish I had bought one of these years ago as it’s a total game changer.
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The Dough:
Page 21 onwards in the Pizza Bible, it’s my favourite dough at the moment. Made two days in advance and cold proved as a large ball for 24 hours then split, balled and cold proved for another 24 hours. Left to warm up 90 minutes before the cook started.
The Sauce:
New York – New Jersey Tomato Sauce from The Pizza Bible book. The San Marzano tomatoes, tomato puree, oregano, salt and oil blitzed with a hand blender then hand crushed tomatoes were also added.
The Fire:
Oxford Charcoal Cherry Lumpwood placed in the tray, 2 flamers underneath, lit and left for 10 minutes.I had a few problems getting the charcoal lit this time so added more flamers but still had trouble. Then I spotted I hadn’t taken the chimney cap off – Doh! With the cap off the fire was raging in no time! Must remember to check that in future.
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Two Oak chunks on top of the lit charcoal:
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The Cook:
I had made a double batch of dough so had two trays, each with 3x 265g dough balls in. I added flour to the tray before I put them in and floured the tops, this helps remove the cling film without tugging the top of the dough balls.
First Pizza: Didn’t quite go to plan. Far too much sauce (3 spoons). It launched fine on the wooden peel but the sauce must have soaked through the dough because when I pulled it out to turn it stuck to the metal peel a bit. I had to give it a good flick to launch it which sent the sauce and cheese flying! Less sauce on the next one.
Second pizza: Two spoons of sauce which worked better this time. The cheese looks to have moved a bit during the cook! Nice crust.
Some garlic oil on top.
Third Pizza: Just one spoon of sauce this time which seemed to work a lot better. Nice crust again.
Fourth Pizza: This one looked great. Sauce and cheese better, maybe too much cheese. Basil went on part way through and topped with garlic oil. Crust was really good on this one.
Maybe needed just a bit more sauce? Looks a bit dry at the edges, maybe 1.5 spoons in future!
Fifth Pizza: The final pizza and my pizza. The dough stretched too thin and you can see it tore on one part when I moved it. Not the end of the world but a shame as this was my pizza and the previous one looked great! Still tasted good but I think I prefer working with the dough when it hasn’t warmed up quite as much, I will just give it an hour or 30 minutes next time so it’s not as stretchy. Sounds a bit counter intuitive but I find it easier to work with when it’s a bit colder, doesn’t stretch out as much which reduces the risk of tearing.
Even the basil leaf can’t hide the hole!
Sweet pizza time! Gu Hazlenut & Chocolate Crunchy Spread.
I cooked this after I had eaten my pizza. Once the wood chunks burn off the Ooni Pro should run around 300C on charcoal which is a better/easier temperature to cook calzone without burning it.
Oozing, melted, warm chocolate. What’s not to love about that!
SUMMARY:
Nice to go back to basics and the pizzas tasted great. I need to work on a few things to improve my technique though. Firstly I will keep the dough a bit cooler as I find it easier to stretch without taking it too thin which leads to tearing. The cheese was sliced and was too big, I will tear it next time. Need to work on the basil too, I tried placing cheese on top of it, placing it part way through and at the end without really working out what worked best. Practice required!
THE BOOK:
The dough and sauce recipe is from The Pizza Bible book:
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If you don’t have an Ooni Pro yet you can buy one here
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