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The Pizza Lab: How Long Should I Let My Dough Cold Ferment?

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An investigation into the amount of time needed to produce the perfect cold-fermented pizza dough.

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Simple Sourdough Pizza Crust: Step-by-Step Guide | Alexandra's Kitchen

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Simple Sourdough Pizza Crust: Step-by-Step Guide | Alexandra's Kitchen

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This sourdough pizza dough recipe features a super high hydration dough (75%) and I have yet to get the same results Alexandra does, BUT she has great tips throughout & links to some neat tools for sourdough baking generally. If you don’t already subscribe to her newsletter, I highly recommend it.

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Here is my guide for making sourdough pizza crust at home. As far as sourdough pizza recipes are concerned, this one is as simple as it gets - it's made with all-purpose flour and there is no autolyse or preferment. Everything gets mixed together at once and you are on your way! Ready? Wake up your starter! Let's do this 🍕🍕🍕

One of the most frequently asked questions I've received these past few weeks is: "Have you ever replaced the yeast in "X" bread recipe with sourdough starter?"

And specifically: "Could I use sourdough starter in your pizza dough recipe?"

Yes! And today, I'm going to show you how. The process is very similar to how I make yeast-leavened pizza, and the resulting pies are similar: ballooned and blistered edges with crisp but pliable crusts. In the recipe below, there are instructions for making three favorite pizzas 🍕🍕🍕:

Simple Sourdough Pizza Crust: The details

This sourdough pizza crust is ...

Basic! Given supply constraints, I didn't get creative with the flour mix here. This dough is made with 100% all-purpose flour. You absolutely can use bread flour or tipo 00 flour (read more about tipo 00 flour here) if you can get your hands on either. If you have been having a hard time finding flour, Baker's Authority is a great option - great prices, too, even with shipping tacked on.

75% hydration. This is a classic sourdough formula: 375 g water, 500 g flour. (Note: This calculation is not quite accurate, because I am not including the weight of the water and flour of the sourdough starter in the calculation.)

Simple! As with all of the sourdough recipes on this site, there is no autolyse or preferment or levain. I do call for some stretches and folds, which build strength in the dough. I like to do 4 stretch and folds, but even if you can only perform one stretch and fold, your dough will benefit.

Can you Freeze Sourdough Pizza Dough?

Yes. In my experience, the pizzas made from frozen dough do not spring as high upon being baked, but they still taste delicious.

Also, in my experience, the more time dough spends in the freezer, the more air bubbles the dough seems to lose. After 1 week in the freezer, my dough will bake up beautifully. After 3 weeks in the freezer, my dough will be less bubbly and will bake into a thinner and crisper crust.

To freeze sourdough pizza dough: make it through step 4 in the recipe below or until after you transfer the portioned rounds to quart containers. At this point, transfer the quart containers to the freezer. To thaw, remove a container (or more) and let thaw in the refrigerator for 1 day or thaw at room temperature for 8 hours. Then, proceed with the recipe.

5 Keys to Excellent Pizza Every Time

Regardless if you are using yeast or sourdough, these (for me) are the keys to making excellent pizza at home every time.

High-hydration Dough: When handled properly, doughs with a high proportion of water relative to the flour bake into beautiful, ballooned-pocketed crusts.

Refrigerator time: After the first rise, time (at least 6 hours, but up to 3 days) in the fridge further develops flavor and improves the texture of the pizza dough.

1 hour at room temperature: If time permits, letting the dough come to room temperature an hour before baking, allows for easier shaping - room temperature dough will more easily stretch into a round than cold dough.

Minimal handling of dough: Using a delicate hand to shape the dough, preserves the air pockets created during the fermentation process. I learned this from Jim Lahey:

"As soon as I began really paying attention to how I shaped my pizza rounds by taking care to use a gentle hand, I noticed a difference in the finished product. The air pockets pervading the unbaked round really affect the texture of the baked pizza."

Baking Steel: As you might know, I am a huge fan of the Baking Steel. In sum: steel is a better conductor of heat than stone - i.e. it transfers heat to the dough faster - which promotes great oven spring which translates to glorious bubbles throughout the dough. (Read more about the Baking Steel here.)

To be clear, I do not think you need to use a sourdough starter to make excellent pizza at home. A high hydration dough + leavening of choice + proper handling will give you excellent pizza every time, including that baked in a skillet: How to Make Excellent Skillet Pizza.

Here's my guide to making yeast-leavened pizza dough at home: How to Make Pizza {*New video added*}

New to Sourdough?

If you are intimidated by sourdough bread baking, I have a free email course that covers the basics: Sourdough: Demystified.

And if you are looking for other easy sourdough bread recipes, this simple sourdough focaccia recipe, as well as this simple sourdough bread recipe, are the recipes I suggest attempting first, both for their simplicity and flavor. Another great beginner's bread recipe to try is this overnight, refrigerator focaccia, which requires minimal effort but yields spectacular results.

PS: Easy, Homemade Pita Bread Recipe

PPS: My Mother's Peasant Bread: The Best Easiest Bread You Will Every Make

Here's the simple sourdough pizza crust play-by-play: As always, is essential for best results. You need water, flour, salt, and sourdough starter.

Combine 375 g water, 100 g sourdough starter, and 10 g salt in a bowl.

Stir to combine; then add ...

... 500 g all-purpose flour.

Stir until you have a sticky dough ball.

Transfer to a straight-sided vessel (if possible) and let rest for 30 minutes. Then, "stretch and fold" the dough (see video for guidance) 4 times at 30 minute intervals. Cover the vessel. Let it rest for 6 to 12 hours (see recipe notes for timing) or until the dough...

... has about doubled in volume. (Note: This is a little bit more than double. Ideally you don't want your dough to rise much beyond double. More recently, in fact, I stop the bulk fermentation when the dough has increased in volume by 50%.)

Turn dough out onto a work surface. Use flour here as needed.

Portion into 4 equal pieces, again using flour as needed.

Ball up and transfer to quart (or other similar-sized) containers (I love these deli quart containers). Transfer to the fridge, ideally for at least 6 hours and up to 3 days.

An hour prior to baking, remove a round (or more) of pizza dough, and place it on a floured work surface. If you have a Baking Steel, place it in the upper third of your oven, and heat the oven to 550ºF. (See recipe for other options.)

Delicately stretch the dough into a round, trying as best you can to preserve those air pockets.

Top as you wish. This one is spread with tomato sauce and topped with fresh mozzarella, parmesan, olive oil, and sea salt.

Transfer pizza, parchment paper and all to a preheated Baking Steel or stone in a 550ºF oven. Bake 5 to 6 minutes or until cooked to your liking.

Slice and serve.

A little fresh basil is always nice.

This is the beauty of the Baking Steel: oven spring!

Another favorite: kale + crème fraîche:

Another favorite: "naked" + spicy scallion (or ramp) oil:

Print

Simple Sourdough Pizza Crust

Description
What you need to make this recipe...:

1. ...a sourdough starter. Ideally, you want to use your starter 4 to 6 hours after you feed it, when it has doubled in volume and is very bubbly and active. Here are three sources:

2. ...time. Once your starter is ready to go, this recipe requires an initial 6 - 18 hour rise, followed by at least 6 hours in the fridge or up to 3 days.

Timing/Schedule:
The more I make sourdough, the more I realize that the timing of each bake depends so much on the time of year and the temperature of my kitchen. In the summer, because it is warm and humid, the first rise (bulk fermentation) of all my sourdoughs takes between 6 - 8 hours; in the winter the first rise takes 12 - 18 hours.

It is best to rely on visual cues. For the bulk fermentation, you want the dough to double (or less than double: I now end my bulk fermentation when the dough has risen by 50% in volume). This is why I cannot recommend using a straight-sided vessel (as opposed to a bowl) enough. It makes gauging the first rise easier.

If at any point you are worried the dough will over-ferment - say, for example, the bulk fermentation is nearly complete but you are tired and want to go to bed - stick the vessel in the fridge and pick up the process in the morning. (Note: If your dough rises above double, don't despair ... my dough has tripled in volume during an overnight rise, and the resulting dough still had plenty of oven strength and spring.)

Schedule: I like mixing this dough in the evening, performing 4 stretch and folds before I go to bed (if time permits), then letting the dough complete its bulk fermentation at room temperature (68ºF) overnight or in the refrigerator (especially in the summer, when my kitchen is much warmer). In the morning, it's typically ready to be portioned (if it rose at room temperature), transferred to quart containers, and stashed in the fridge. If I had let my dough spend time in the fridge for the bulk fermentation, I remove it in the morning, and let it complete its bulk fermentation at room temperature. Once complete, I portion the dough and stash it in the fridge. Sometimes I'll use the dough that same evening; sometimes I'll use it the following day or the next. I encourage using the dough within 3 days.

In short: If you want pizza for the weekend, mix your dough on either Wednesday or Thursday.

Troubleshooting: If you have issues with your dough being too sticky, please read this post: Why is my sourdough so sticky? The 4 common mistakes.
Flour choice:

Due to supply issues, I've been making this recipe with all-purpose flour, and it works beautifully. You absolutely can use bread flour or tipo 00 flour if you can get your hands on either. If you can't, know that all-purpose (unbleached) flour works great here. If you use 00 flour, you'll likely need to reduce the amount of water. I would start with 350 g, and adjust moving forward based on your results.
Favorite Pizza-Making Tools:

Pizza Peel

Parchment Paper: I bake my pizzas on parchment paper on my Baking Steel. Parchment allows for easy transfer from peel to steel.

Cast Iron Skillet: If you do not have a Steel or stone, you can use a cast iron skillet. Rub a half teaspoon of oil over its surface, transfer a stretched dough round to the skillet. Top as desired. Bake at 450ºF for about 15 minutes.

Quart Containers for storing dough

For the dough:

100 g sourdough starter, active and bubbly, see notes above

500 g all-purpose or bread flour

For each Margherita pizza:

2 tablespoons tomato sauce

handful of grated Parmigiano Reggiano (less than an ounce)

drizzle olive oil

pinch sea salt

For each kale and crème fraiche pizza:

For each naked pizza with ramp or scallion oil:

1/4 cup olive oil

1/4 cup minced scallions or ramps

1 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes

1 to 2 tablespoons crème fraîche

handful grated Parmigiano Reggiano

sea salt

1. Mix the dough. Place the starter, salt, and water in a large bowl. Stir with a spatula to combine - it doesn't have to be uniformly mixed. Add the flour. Mix again until the flour is completely incorporated. Transfer to a straight-sided vessel (if you have one.) Cover vessel with tea towel or cloth bowl cover and let stand 30 minutes.

2. Stretch and fold: after 30 minutes have passed, reach into the vessel and pull the dough up and into the center. Turn the vessel quarter turns and continue this pulling 8 to 10 times. See video for guidance. Let the dough rest for another 30 minutes; then repeat the stretching and folding. If possible, repeat this cycle twice more for a total of 4 stretch and folds. By the 4th cycle, you will notice a huge difference in the texture of the dough: it will be smoother, stronger, and more elastic.

3. Bulk fermentation: Cover vessel with a tea towel or bowl cover and set aside to rise at room temperature (70ºF/21ºC) for 4 to 18 hours (the time will vary depending on the time of year, the strength of your starter, and the temperature of your kitchen; see notes above) or until the dough has roughly doubled in volume. (UPDATE: In the past I have recommended letting the dough rise until it doubles in volume. If you've had success with this, continue to let the dough double. Recently, I have been stopping the bulk fermentation when the dough increases by 50% in volume, and I feel my dough is even stronger in the end.) Note: Do not use your oven with the light on for the bulk fermentation - it is too warm for the dough. When determining when the bulk fermentation is done, it is best to rely on visual cues (doubling in volume) as opposed to time. A straight-sided vessel makes monitoring the bulk fermentation especially easy because it allows you to see when your dough has truly doubled.

4. Portion and shape: Turn the dough out onto a work surface and shape into a rough ball, using as much flour as needed - the dough will be sticky. Using a bench scraper, divide the dough into 4 equal portions. Sprinkle portions with flour. With floured hands, roll each portion into a ball, using the pinkie-edges of your hands to pinch the dough underneath each ball. Transfer each round of dough to a plastic quart container, cover, and store in fridge for at least 6 hours or up to 3 days or transfer to the freezer (see notes in post about thawing).

5. Make the pizzas: Pull out a round (or more) of dough from the fridge one hour before you plan on baking. Dust dough with flour and place on a floured work surface. Let sit untouched for about an hour (a little longer or shorter is fine). Place a Baking Steel or pizza stone in the top third of your oven. Set oven to 550ºF. Heat oven for at least 45 minutes but ideally 1 hour prior to baking.

6. Shape the dough: Gently shape dough into a 10-inch (roughly) round handling it as minimally as possible. (See video for guidance.) Lay a sheet of parchment paper on top of a pizza peel. Transfer the dough round to the parchment-lined peel.

Top and Bake

To make a classic Margherita-style pizza: Spread 2 tablespoons of tomato sauce over the surface of the dough. Top with mozzarella to taste. Sprinkle with parmesan to taste. Drizzle with olive oil. Sprinkle lightly with sea salt. Shimmy the pizza, parchment paper and all into the oven. Bake pizza until top is blistered, about 5-6 minutes. Transfer to cutting board. Sprinkle with basil, if you have it. Cut and serve. Discard parchment paper.

To make a kale and crème fraîche pizza: Place the kale in a small bowl, drizzle with olive oil, season with sea salt, and toss. Spoon crème fraîche over the dough leaving a 1/2-inch border or so-I use about a tablespoon per pizza. Sprinkle with minced garlic and a handful of grated Parmigiano Reggiano. Top with the kale. Shimmy the pizza, parchment paper and all into the oven. Bake pizza until top is blistered, about 5 - 6 minutes. Transfer to cutting board. Cut and serve. Discard parchment paper.

To make a naked pizza with scallion oil: Heat 1/4 cup olive oil in a skillet with 1/4 cup of minced scallions (or ramps!) and 1 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes. Keep it over low heat while you make the pizza. Spoon crème fraîche over the dough leaving a 1/2-inch border or so-I use about a tablespoon per pizza. Sprinkle with a handful of grated parmesan. Shimmy the pizza, parchment paper and all into the oven. Bake pizza until top is blistered, about 5 - 6 minutes. Transfer to cutting board. At this point, the scallions should be starting to "frizzle". If they aren't, crank up the heat until the oil is sizzling. Spoon a few tablespoons of the hot oil over the pizza (you'll have extra oil). Sprinkle with a pinch of sea salt. Cut and serve.

Keywords: sourdough, pizza, simple, margherita, mozzarella

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Simple Sourdough Pizza Crust: Step-by-Step Guide | Alexandra's Kitchen

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Here is my guide for making sourdough pizza crust at home. As far as sourdough pizza recipes are concerned, this one is as simple as it gets - it's made with all-purpose flour and there is no autolyse or preferment. Everything gets mixed together at once and you are on your way!

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Pop quiz: What do whipped cream, Nerf footballs, pizza, and Tempur-Pedic mattresses have in common? That's right - they're all foams.

Wait, huh? Pizzas are foams? You mean those annoying, piddly things that chefs were goofing around with in the mid 2000s? Yup, as are hot dog buns, Wonderbread, Pane di Genzano, Portuguese rolls, Naan, pancakes, and pretty much every other leavened batter or dough-based product in the world.

Why do I bring this up now? Well, it's not quite obvious, but once you start thinking of bread as a solid foam, it becomes much, much easier to understand its mechanics; how leavening works, what gluten development is, oven spring, and the like. Today, we're going to discuss a subject that we've danced around a few times in the past (like when we were exploring how to make Neapolitan-style pizza at home even without a wood-burning 1000°F oven), but have never really explored in detail.

Now for you professional bakers and pizzafreaks out there, after today you'll probably still feel like we haven't really explored the subject in detail, but flour is a gigantic can of worms that only gets deeper and deeper, and for most of us, a good understanding of the very top layer is good enough for our needs.

Foams, Defined

First off, what exactly is a foam? At its most basic, it's a collection of many air or gas-filled bubbles accumulated into a single larger mass.

Fluid foams, such as shaving cream, a whipped meringue, sea scum, or the head on your beer is made of bubbles surrounded by a viscous liquid. The bubbles can slip and slide past each other, giving the entire mass mobility and shape-ability. But here's the interesting part. Depending on the viscosity and surface tension of the liquid, the strength of the individual bubbles in a foam can vary greatly. Plain water can hold a few tiny bubbles for a brief period of time on its surface. Thicken that water up or change the characteristics of its bonding with, say, some soap, and you can suddenly form much larger bubbles with sturdier structure.

Bubble size can also vary greatly depending on how the bubbles are formed. Though their size is limited by the strength of the bonds between individual liquid molecules, the mechanical means by which they are formed can change their size dramatically. Agitate a bubble bath slowly, or blow through a soapy film and you can create very large bubbles. Vigorously shake that exact same solution or better yet, throw it into a blender or beat it with a mixer, and you can create very fine bubbles indeed.

But again, what's this all got to do with bread?

Bread = Solid Foam

Turns out that bread is a solid foam - that is, a foam that's been treated after it's formed to solidify its walls and firm up its structure (ever look inside a sliced loaf of bread and wonder why it looks so much like the top of a bubble bath?). And just like with soapy water vs. plain water, the exact makeup of the walls of these bubbles and the way in which they are formed can affect their size and strength. Without bubbles, bread would be a solid brick of protein and starch, much like, say, a dog biscuit. It's the inclusion of bubbles of gas that make bread tender, chewy, and, well, edible.

While there are a number of factors that can affect bubble characteristics in bread foams, the overriding factor by far is the type of flour your use, and more specifically, its protein content.

Wheat flour, the ground up grain of the wheat plant, is composed largely of absorptive, sticky starch molecules, along with a few protein molecules, most importantly the molecules gliadin and glutenin. It's these molecules that cross-link with each other in the presence of water, forming the strong, elastic matrix known as gluten. Gluten is like soap for your dough. The more gluten is formed, the easier it is to form large, robust, stretchy bubbles in your loaf. Thus, just like adding more Mr. Bubble will make your bubble bath foamier, the more protein in your flour, the larger and more robust the bubbles you can form in your dough.

Okay, okay. There are other factors that can affect your flour performance as well. Check out this article for a more thorough rundown of wheat varieties.

Dough for bread in which you want very large bubbles (like pizza!) should be reinforced with enough gluten that you can stretch it out thin enough to see through (this is known as the "windowpane" test). In order to form this tough matrix, dough must be kneaded until the proteins link up with each other strongly,* and as we've seen in the past, the food processor is the best way to rapidly develop gluten in your dough.

*there are exceptions to this rule, such as with no-knead style doughs, in which the dough is simply allowed to sit out overnight. Through a combination of autolysis, plenty of water, and the action of yeast bubble production, the dough essentially kneads itself, forming gluten with almost no outside help.

When it comes to pizza, there are a number of options. Let's take a look at some of them.

The Major Types of Flour

Believing that the experts of the world will ever agree on what makes the best pizza dough is as crazy as thinking that Wilykit and Wilykat will give up their mischievous ways, but there are certainly a few things we can all agree upon when it comes to Neapolitan pizza crust.

Caputo "00" Bread Flour

Protein Content: 12.5%
Water Absorption: low

This is the gold standard of pizza flours by which most others are judged, but there's quite a bit of confusion as to exactly what it is. You'll read in countless sources that Italian Tipo "00" flour, like the Caputo, is a "soft wheat flour," with a low protein content. This is absolutely untrue and anybody who continues to spread this rumor should be immediately chastised with great prejudice.

The fact is, the label Tipo "00" has nothing to do with protein content. Rather, it refers to the fineness of the milling. Tipo "00" is the finest grade of flour milled in Italy, and it has a consistency similar to baby powder. It's available with several different levels of protein intended for different baking projects, just like American flours (which we'll get to in a moment). The ones you'll most commonly see in pizzerias are the red Rinforzato bag, which features pictures of pizzas and bread, the blue Pizzeria bag, which pictures a single pizza, and - the most common in the U.S. - the red The Chef's Flour bags, which, in fact, contain the exact same flour as the Rinforzato. All three bags of flour have the exact same protein content: 12.5%

Because of the fineness of their milling, they don't need quite as much water as an equivalent American flour (try making a 65% hydrated dough with "00" and American bread flour side-by-side and you'll find that the "00" is much runnier).

So what's the difference between the Rinforzato and the Pizzeria? Caputo guards that secret very closely, though one could assume it has to do with the blend of wheats that make it into the bag. As far as baking with them goes, I've not noticed a huge difference between the red and blue bags-both produce admirably workable doughs that produce great crust with a crackly-thin layer of crispness, a nice open and airy hole structure, and just a modicum of chew. I stick with the red bag, because it's easiest to find (Whole Foods carries it, and you can order it in 10 kilogram packs from Amazon).

Most Neapolitan pizza dough recipes you see around here attempt to come up with viable substitutes for Caputo "00." None of them really work precisely. Do yourself a favor and order it online.

All-Purpose Flour

Protein Content: 11.7%
Water Absorption: moderate

King Arthur all-purpose flour has a slightly higher protein content than most other brands, which clock in at around 10.5 to 11%. All-purpose flour is exactly what it sounds like. With a moderate protein content, it's does a decent job at a wide range of goods from pizza and bread to cakes and biscuits. However, it doesn't excel at any of them.

As you can see, bubble development is limited, giving you a network of relatively small bubbles instead of the large, irregular structure you get with the "00". With cakes and pastry, you'll have the opposite problem; biscuits come out a little tougher than you'd like, and cakes with a distinct chewiness. If there's only one flour you keep in your pantry, this should be the one, but if you've got the space, you might want to consider a few specialized flours.

Bread Flour

Protein Content: 12.7%
Water Absorption: high

American bread flour has a protein content similar to that of the Caputo bread flour (King Arthur's actually gets a little bit higher even). The main difference in how it behaves is due to the exact type of wheat used and the grind size-American bread flour produces stretchier, chewier breads than Italian "00" bread flour. Whether or not this is a good thing is totally up to user preference.

As you can see, the foam structure bread flour produces is significantly more robust and irregular than that of all-purpose flour. Similarly, it's also stretchier and chewier. For Neapolitan pizza, this means that you're going to end up with a taller cornicione, and better protection against sagging out with sauce and watery cheese. Will it produce a traditional Neapolitan pizza with a super-crisp, airy, and delicate crust? No. But the pizza it does produce is great for its own merits.

Bread flour requires a little more water than most other flours to produce doughs of equivalent viscosity. Because of its high protein content, some people may find bread flour doughs a little difficult to stretch - it has a tendency to bounce back. The key is to make sure that it's well-rested before you being to stretch it.

Side Note: do not try to bake a cake using bread flour.

Cake or Pastry Flour

Protein Content: 9.4%
Water Absorption: low

Of all the types of flour, Cake is the one that produces doughs and batters that are most obviously foam-like, with many small, delicate, tightly packed bubbles. It's what gives cakes and biscuits their dense yet delicate texture. Because of the misconception that "00" flour is a low-protein flour, many people recommend using some proportion of cake or pastry flour in their pizza dough. While this will indeed produce a softer finished product with a thinner, crisper crust around a tender center, you run into a few problems. check this out:

While there are a few large bubbles in the cornicione, these bubbles are not formed by stretching out a small bubble into a large bubble the way they are formed with high-protein flour doughs. Rather, those bubbles are formed when many smaller bubbles collapse and break into each other, due to their weak structure. The results is a crumb structure that is not so much chewy or stretchy as it is tender.

The other, even bigger problem is underneath the sauce and the cheese. As you can see, the dough gets mushed down and compressed to an almost paste-like state. The walls of the individual bubbles are simply not strong enough to support any kind of weight on top of them. What should be light and airy instead loses steam (quite literally), becoming dense and gummy.

Save the cake flour for the cake!

King Arthur "Italian Style" Flour

Protein Content: 8.5%
Water Absorption: low

A couple of years ago, King Arthur came out with what they call a "00" clone, intended to be a competitor to the Italian brands. Frankly, it's no competition. For some baffling reason, they decided to use an even lower protein content than their normal pastry flour, resulting in doughs that bake up ultra-tender and crisp- good things - but with no chew and a very easily-collapsable structure - bad things.

I've still yet to see a completely acceptable substitute for Italian flour.

So What's It All Mean?

Well, as I said, this is hardly a complete guide to flour. We haven't even touched on bleaching, bromating, whole grain vs. refined, differences between brands, not to mention other factors that affect dough like yeast, water content, and mixing, all of which can make profound differences on your finished product.

Pizza dough is as personal as topping choices - even more so in fact. Ask any two pizza-makers, whether they be home pizzafreaks or professional pizzaioli and you'll get two different recommendations for which flours to use. Having an understanding of how flour works and what different types of flours are out there is a very valuable first step towards coming up with your own ideal blend, but the real key with finding a dough that works for you is to just jump in and get your hands dirty.

And the next time you shave, toss the football around, or hop in the bubble bath, think about your dough. You'll be a richer, wiser, better-fed person for it.

More tests, more results! Follow The Food Lab on Facebook or Twitter.

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A description of pizza flour types and how foams help to make dough (and thus pizza!) possible.

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This Pizza Dough Hydration Trial blog post is an interesting look at how hydration affects your dough/crust. Note that the author uses a high protein (13%) all purpose flour. There is no "perfect hydration" magic number...there are just too many variables. But this post will help you better understand the role hydration plays in creating that light, airy structure you're likely after.