Perfect Pizza

Have you ever eaten pizza in Naples? This is not that pizza. A slice of pie from a Brooklyn pizzeria? It’s not that either. It’s kind of like the illegitimate love child of the two. The dough is all it should be; bubbly, aromatic, with a magnificent crust of a fine Italian bake. The tangy topping transports me to standing in Joe’s Pizza in Williamsburg, eating a slice bigger than my head and trying not to spill any sauce on my shoes. It takes a couple of days, but very minimal intervention and I believe the reward is absolutely worth it. For a deeper understanding and a few substitutions, see the kitchen notes below.

Makes 4 x 10” pizzas

Ingredients

Day 1

1g dried active yeast *realistically, it’s a pinch

200g water

200g strong white flour

Day 2

6g dried active yeast

80g water

150g strong white flour

10g sugar

10g fine sea salt

1tbsp olive oil

400g poolish (from day 1)

Tomato sauce

2 x 400g tins good quality plum tomatoes 

1tbsp olive oil

1 clove garlic

Salt and sugar, to taste

Toppings

Semolina, for dusting

Flour, for dusting

Anything you like! Here are a couple of my favourites;

1.Sundried tomatoes, wet mozzarella & parmesan

2.Pepperoni, jalapenos & firm mozzarella (pure filth)

3.Anchovies, capers & marinated peppers

Method

Day 1: Make the poolish

Combine the yeast with the water and leave for 5 minutes until completely dissolved. Add the flour and mix to combine. Cover and leave at room temperature for 12-16 hours, until bubbly and active. This is best done late in the evening, giving you plenty of time the next morning to make the dough. After 12 hours, it should look bubbly and alive, like this:

Day 2: Make the dough

Combine the yeast with the water and leave for 5 minutes until completely dissolved. Add this with all of the other ingredients to the poolish, then use a dough scraper or a wooden spoon to combine everything. When the dough is thoroughly mixed, tip it onto a clean worktop and work the dough until it is smooth and elastic, about 5-8 minutes. The dough will be very wet and a bit sticky, so try to handle it as little as possible. I recommend using the slap and fold technique, rather than traditional kneading, to get air into the dough and develop elasticity without getting covered in the stuff. You can watch a video of me demonstrating this technique here. 

When the dough is ready, divide it into 4 and place into 4 separate containers around triple the size of the dough, and cover. Leave the dough to prove at room temperature for 30 minutes, then transfer into the fridge for at least 8 hours or overnight for an even deeper flavour. 

Tomato sauce

Tip the tinned tomatoes into a sieve and drain off the tomato juice. Transfer the tomatoes to a blender and pulse a few times until you have a rough puree. Place the olive oil in a heavy based saucepan over a low heat and grate in the garlic. Warm gently until the garlic sizzles and becomes aromatic, without colouring. Add the tomatoes and cook gently for 30-45 minutes, until the sauce has thickened and turned deep red in colour. Season with salt and sugar to taste and leave to cool. 

To assemble

Preheat the oven to 240°C fan. Place a flat baking sheet on the top shelf of the oven and dust another with semolina. Dust a clean worktop with flour and place one of the pieces of dough on top. Pull in any outer edges to meet in the middle, then flip the dough over so that the seam is underneath. Roll the dough out to a 10” circle, rotating the dough ¼ turn every time you roll. Carefully transfer the dough onto the prepared baking sheet. Spread 1tbsp tomato sauce over the surface, leaving a 1cm border around the edges, then scatter over your desired toppings.

When ready to bake, shuffle the pizza onto the hot oven tray and close the oven door as quickly as possible. Bake for 7 minutes or until the dough is golden brown and the toppings are beginning to caramelise. Build the next pizza in the same way while the first is in the oven. When cooked, transfer to a wire rack to cool and replace the tray in the oven for the next pizza. 

Enjoy immediately! 

Kitchen notes

I tried a great many recipes before I ended up here. None of them were giving me the intensely flavoured dough or the golden crust I was looking for. In the end, I made up my own. I started with a couple of recipes I liked and tweaked the quantities to give an 80% hydration dough. I decided to try a pre-ferment (the poolish) to increase the extensibility of the dough and make it easier to handle. The combination of a wetter dough and a longer fermentation created the exact effect I was hoping for, a thin crust with ample flavour and let’s be honest, really sexy air bubbles. 

Flour plays an important part here, I used Marriages manitoba flour, as it is high in protein and milled to exceptional quality.  For a more authentic Italian flavour, you could substitute 50% of the flour for 00 flour, made from Italian wheat which will give a flavour “of the place”. Semolina gives an exceptional texture to the exterior of the dough, with the added benefit of helping it not to stick.

The yeast is dried active but could easily be substituted for fresh yeast by simply doubling the quantity. Due to the long fermentation period, I wouldn’t recommend using a fast acting yeast here. 

Quality tinned tomatoes are vital, they should be the best quality you can find and not the supermarket basics. The flavour when cooked should be tangy, rounded and slightly sweet- use salt and sugar to balance the flavours accordingly. 

Pizza toppings should always be cooked or marinated, as raw vegetables will render water into your pizza dough and prevent it from crisping up as it should. Sundried tomatoes, marinated peppers and anchovies work brilliantly for this reason. Beware of very wet mozzarella, it can be helpful to drain it on kitchen paper before adding to the pizza. Add any fresh toppings such as rocket, basil or parma ham once the pizza is out of the oven.