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Re: Dough questions for the experts
One last post to pizzafun...
I go back to one fundatmental. Choose a recipe that is appropriate to your oven (whether conventional or WFO) andl learn to make it work (varying hydration is fine). That includes choosing a flour and sticking to it. And if you want WFO dough there is nothing wrong with Neopolitan dough made with Caputo flour. But KA AP is more widely available and in my expeirence more consistent (and that helps, but Caputo has its appeal). My inclusion of NeoNeopolitan doughs was to provide perspective on how different flours impact dough behaviour and use of additives to compensate for the characteristics of a given flour.
Real Italian flour is amazingly differnet from US flour and presents its own set of issues. KA Italian is IMO an amazingly similar flour to Caputo. But other than that I think you should approach every flour as being unique until you establish otherwise.
The most consistent flours I have used are IMO KA AP and KA BF with Gold Medal a not bad second (not IMO great flour but at least consistent and consistency is really important while you are learning. (One of the reasons I am NOT a big Caputo fan is lack of consistency - I have had Caputo flours require up to 10% shifts in hydration due to the water content of the flour (and the commercial pizzaria I consult with has had similar issues. Note: I love to work with Caputo, it has some wonderful characteristics. Consistency does not seem to be one of them. And for beginners and people wanting to refine their doughs consistency of the flour is rather critical IMO. (Okay, let's see, we add water, salt, and yeast to the flour. Which three are likely to be more consistent??? Flour is clearly the bigger variable! Reducing that varibable is really helpful which is why I encourage beginners to use KA!)
Not that I am opposed to other flours. Other flours can be a lot of fun but they can be REALLY frustratiing. Especially if they are inconsistent or weird. (Example, I just finished off a couple of bags of AP (not KA) that required me to drop my hydration by almost 20 percent to make a (sort of) comparable bread dough. I made some amazingly decent loaves of bread from it but I swore at the damn flour every time for I simply could not convince myself it was really that strange. If I had followed a recipe for the dough it would have been a disaster for it was sticky and liquid and you would almost certianly end up wearing it. Is that unique? Well sort of. By far the worst I have experienced. But flour varies a lot and the less variation you face the easier things will be. So I suggest KA.
As I said in the previous email, I am out of here for a while. Faith and others know the ropes and will provide good advice!
Good Luck!
Jay
One last post to pizzafun...
I go back to one fundatmental. Choose a recipe that is appropriate to your oven (whether conventional or WFO) andl learn to make it work (varying hydration is fine). That includes choosing a flour and sticking to it. And if you want WFO dough there is nothing wrong with Neopolitan dough made with Caputo flour. But KA AP is more widely available and in my expeirence more consistent (and that helps, but Caputo has its appeal). My inclusion of NeoNeopolitan doughs was to provide perspective on how different flours impact dough behaviour and use of additives to compensate for the characteristics of a given flour.
Real Italian flour is amazingly differnet from US flour and presents its own set of issues. KA Italian is IMO an amazingly similar flour to Caputo. But other than that I think you should approach every flour as being unique until you establish otherwise.
The most consistent flours I have used are IMO KA AP and KA BF with Gold Medal a not bad second (not IMO great flour but at least consistent and consistency is really important while you are learning. (One of the reasons I am NOT a big Caputo fan is lack of consistency - I have had Caputo flours require up to 10% shifts in hydration due to the water content of the flour (and the commercial pizzaria I consult with has had similar issues. Note: I love to work with Caputo, it has some wonderful characteristics. Consistency does not seem to be one of them. And for beginners and people wanting to refine their doughs consistency of the flour is rather critical IMO. (Okay, let's see, we add water, salt, and yeast to the flour. Which three are likely to be more consistent??? Flour is clearly the bigger variable! Reducing that varibable is really helpful which is why I encourage beginners to use KA!)
Not that I am opposed to other flours. Other flours can be a lot of fun but they can be REALLY frustratiing. Especially if they are inconsistent or weird. (Example, I just finished off a couple of bags of AP (not KA) that required me to drop my hydration by almost 20 percent to make a (sort of) comparable bread dough. I made some amazingly decent loaves of bread from it but I swore at the damn flour every time for I simply could not convince myself it was really that strange. If I had followed a recipe for the dough it would have been a disaster for it was sticky and liquid and you would almost certianly end up wearing it. Is that unique? Well sort of. By far the worst I have experienced. But flour varies a lot and the less variation you face the easier things will be. So I suggest KA.
As I said in the previous email, I am out of here for a while. Faith and others know the ropes and will provide good advice!
Good Luck!
Jay
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