Hi Lisa, thanks for the question. I would also suspect the issue is due to using wholemeal flour.

00 pizza flour (such as Caputo) is what I always recommend for pizza. It is specifically made to be soft, stretchy, and light to produce the desired effect in the pizza.

What you could experiment with is mixing pizza flour with wholemeal flour. You shouldn’t have any issues using 20% wholemeal, for example. You could also experiment using higher amounts.

I hope this helps and good luck!

Any suggestions why that happened? I suspect it was the fact I used wholemeal flour but thought I would ask.

Hi Dom, personally I’m not keen on semolina. I find it tends to burn easily and produce quite a strong flavour.

I prefer to use a high quality Italian 00 pizza flour (such as Caputo). These are designed to withstand high temperatures and are therefore quite resistant to burning.

I then try to ensure that the shaped pizza has as little flour on the base as possible prior to launching. It needs just enough to prevent sticking and no more.

But of course, much of it is personal preference so feel free to experiment and see what you like best!

Thanks for the question and good luck!

Great tips. Always trying to get more ‘spring’ and reading interest technique.

Love the tip on the crossing the pointing fingers to make a circular finger shape when stretching. Makes sense.

My question: the use of semolina. I flour the dough out of the tray for stretching, but then my kids love that grainy semolina on the bottom of the pizza. Does a little bit is semolina make any difference at all? Apart from aesthetics and ‘feel’?

Dom

Hi Sally. From the supermarket, I have found Galbani to be quite nice. But I agree that the cheaper ones are probably not worth using.

If you’re getting a rubber flavour though, it could be that the mozzarella is overcooking.

If you are using a pizza oven, make sure you are not cooking the pizza for more than 90 seconds. If you are using a regular home oven, I would advise experimenting with adding the mozzarella later so that it doesn’t burn. For example, try cooking the base (with tomato sauce on) for around 1-2 minutes before adding the mozzarella and finishing off.

It could also be worth experimenting with both the fresh mozzarella (in brine) and the dried mozzarella. Some people prefer one over the other. I like both personally, though the fresh stuff is more authentic.

I hope that helps Sally. Good luck!

Hi Campbell, yes a longer prove would definitely help with that. In my latest pizza school series I do a 24 hour dough which you could try here, it’s actually a little easier than the poolish.

Or you could halve the amount of yeast and go for a 48 hour prove which would help even more.

But if you want to stick to poolish you could try halving the amount of yeast in the poolish which should double the prove time. So you would prove the poolish for 20 hours and then prove the dough for a further 20 hours.

The other option if you’re making lots of pizzas, is that you could ball the doughs at different times. Eg ball 1/3 of the dough balls at 6 hours (before shaping), 1/3 at 4 hours, and 1/3 at 2 hours. This way you’ll have at least a 4 hour window to work with. Just be sure to use the dough that is the most proved each time.

I hope this makes sense. Good luck!

Hi Bill, there’s a number of things that could be causing the issue. I think it’s unlikely that the water temperature is the problem so I wouldn’t worry about that.

Are the dough balls airtight in the dough trays? If they are forming a skin this is a sign that they are not air tight and are drying out.

I assume that all the trays get the same amount of proof time? Overproving can cause toughness but it could also be underproved. Is the walk-in the same temperature throughout?

How much yeast do you use and how long do you prove before balling, and at what temperature? What temperature is your walk-in?

If you could answer the above questions for me please Bill, I may be able to help. Thanks

Problem with some trays dough is too tough and can not figure out where we are going wrong. We measure out everything so it’s all the same. Not sure on water temp. We put our dough after mixing into a plastic 5 gallon bucket, damp cloth over top. When it rises to top so it looks like a mushroom on top, we roll it and then cut with dough divider.

Can you over rise dough, will this make it to tough? It’s too tough to roll out for the pans. Can not figure it out. Thanks hope you can help, look forward to hearing from you, Bill