I am on a pizza crusade.

I decided this… 5 minutes ago.

I’ve written a few things about pizza in the past. First about grilling pizza, then a recipe for pizza dough. More recently, I wrote an article about pairing beer and pizza for RateBeer‘s Hop Press.

The dough recipe that I wrote about was from Fine Cooking, and in the past it’s worked pretty well for me. But recently, I’ve been having trouble getting the texture of the dough right, and it’s been… frustrating.

The last couple of times, the dough was way too soft and would quickly stretch to the point of tearing. I ended up having to skip the pizza stone since the dough wasn’t strong enough to be shimmied onto it full of toppings. So, I gently stretched the dough directly on a baking sheet, topped it, stuck it in the oven, and ate my somewhat floppy (yet still tasty) pizza.

I decided to search for some pizza dough troubleshooting online, and I happened across a site called Encyclopizza. Not an incredibly attractive site, but incredibly informative nonetheless!

It turns out that the Fine Cooking recipe I had been using had way too much water in it. Typically, the amount of water used is between 48-58% the weight of the flour. For 1 lb of flour, this equates to 7.4-8.9 oz of water. I was using 11 oz. Yeesh!

Plus, when using a flour that has a protein level less than 14%, you need to use even less water to achieve the proper elasticity. I discovered that the bread flour I was using (King Arthur Unbleached Bread Flour) only has a protein level of 12.7%. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, I just should have compensated by using less water.

In addition, the Fine Cooking recipe calls for 1 ¼ tsp instant yeast. I glossed over the word “instant” and assumed that my active dry yeast would be equivalent. Not the case. Most of the recipes from Encyclopizza call for 2 ½ active dry yeast. No wonder I wasn’t getting enough rise out of my dough!

Also, I was making thinner crust pizzas, which can be difficult if the dough is too rich. Rich dough is higher in oil and sugar than lean dough. A rich dough is sweeter and more tender, but a lean dough is stronger, which is better for a thin crust.

A lean dough typically uses oil in the amount of 0.5-3% the weight of the flour. This is equivalent to about ½ tsp-1 tbsp for 1 lb of flour. A rich dough would be 4-15%, or 1 ½-5 ½ tbsp. I was using 1 ½ tbsp, which is in the lowest end of the rich range. Not terrible, but probably not optimal.

As far as the sugar content, typically sugar is used in the amount of 0-5% the weight of the flour, which is 1 tbsp or less of honey. The Fine Cooking recipe was in this range, but I wanted the dough to be a bit sweeter than it was. Plus, sugar actually speeds up the rate of fermentation as it approaches 5% by weight, though beyond that, it begins to slow it down.

The only part of the recipe I didn’t feel the need to change was the salt. Salt also slows down fermentation when more than 1% is used, but it’s also necessary for improving the flavor of the dough. The typical range is 1-2% the weight of the flour. The Fine Cooking recipe was 2%, so I found no need to change that.

So, after all these considerations, this is what I came up with (percentages indicate the percent by weight of the ingredient compared to the weight of the flour):

Old recipe	New recipe
1 lb bread flour	1 lb bread flour
11 oz water (72%)	8 oz water (52%)
1 ½ tbsp olive oil (4%)	1 tbsp olive oil (3%)
2 tsp honey (3%)	1 tbsp honey (5%)
2 ½ tsp kosher salt (2%)	2 ½ tsp kosher salt (2%)
1 ¼ tsp instant yeast	2 ½ tsp active dry yeast

I have high hopes for this tweaked recipe and can’t wait to test it out. Stay tuned for the results!