Sourdough Pizza

Hello HTS Community

Who does not love pizza??? Pizza is such a simple and lovable plate of food, that you just can never say no. There is no specific recipe, just load it with fresh tomato sauce, lots of cheese, top with some pesto and toppings of your choice. But, the magic lies in the crust. It is the goodness of the crust, that makes or breaks a pizza.

There are multiple ways to create the dough for crust using commercial yeast or a sourdough starter, and today we are going to make the later one. There’s no pizza like sourdough pizza! With a crispy, chewy crust that is perfectly loaded with all the good stuff.

Once you have a mature starter, you won’t believe how easy it is to make pizza the classic Italian way, or Naples-style, the birth place of pizza. You could also try my recipe for a Sourdough bread and Ciabatta.

Ingredients you will need

For Dough

• Good bread/pizza flour- 225g or 1+1/4 cup
• Whole wheat flour- 25g or 3 tablespoon
• Water- 168ml
• Sourdough starter– 63g or about 1/4 cup
• Olive Oil- 1 tablespoon
• Sea Salt- 3g or 1/2 teaspoon

For Sauce

• Fresh tomatoes- 3 large (blanched)
• Garlic- 1 clove
• Olive Oil- 1 tablespoon
• Sugar- 1/2 teaspoon
• Salt- to taste
• Oregano- 1/4 teaspoon

For Pizza

• Fresh Mozzarella
• Basil leaves
• Olive oil
• Semolina
• Mushrooms

Steps to make Sourdough Pizza:

Tomato Sauce

• In a pan, heat olive oil, add chopped garlic and finely chopped tomatoes along with salt and sugar. Cook for 5 minutes on medium heat or until the water is absorbed and add oregano. Cool down and store in refrigerator.

The Dough

• To start, you should have active starter. Mix water and starter in a large mixing bowl, add salt and flour to form a dough. I know the dough will be sticky, so use a spatula to bring this thing together, and use hands only if needed. Cover with a kitchen towel for 30 minutes.

Folding & Resting

• With your wet fingers, grab one end of the dough and stretch as much as you can before it starts to break, and fold over the center. Rotate the bowl, and perform similar action until the entire dough has been stretched.
• Perform 3 sets of stretch and folds spaced out by 30 minutes, place the dough back in the warm area to rest.

Bulk Fermentation and Baking

• Grease a straight sided container with olive oil, and transfer the dough into it. On the outside of the container, mark the level of dough, so that later you can see how much the volume has increased. Rub olive oil on the top of the dough to prevent the skin from drying. Cover with a damp kitchen towel.
• Let the wild yeast work it’s magic for about 4-5 hours, or until the dough volume has nearly doubled. It took me about 5 hours because of the cold temperature. For hotter temperatures, it can take about 3 hours.
• After the volume increase, divide the dough in two equal parts and place them in different takeaway containers greased with olive oil. Cover the containers with lid and transfer to a refrigerator for 24-36 hours.
• Pre-heat the oven to 250 degree Celsius or higher, the maximum your oven can go, and place a baking stone or cast iron tawa on the lower shelf of the oven. It is extremely important to place the pizza on a hot surface in the oven, else you will miss the crust. If you do not have either of pizza stone or cast iron pan, place the baking tray on the lower shelf to heat, we can bake pizza on that.
• On a piece of parchment paper, sprinkle flour and semolina, bring one of the dough balls and gently start to flatten and stretch the dough with your hands. It should be about a 9 inch circle. Form a thicker border around the edge for a lovely, bubbly pizza crust.
• Spread the sauce evenly, add cheese and desired toppings, drizzle some olive oil, and bake for 10-12 minutes at 250 degree Celsius. Enjoy immediately.

Sample Schedule for the recipe:

Day 1

• 1pm: Mix your dough
• 1:30pm: Fold #1
• 2:00pm: Fold #2
• 2:30pm: Fold #3, and set aside for bulk fermentation
• 7:30pm: Divide in two and refrigerate

Day 2

• 7:30pm: Preheat oven along with pizza stone and bake your pizza.