Pizza ovens

Have never frozen but will be trying it out and have been looking into it lately.

I wonder does your quick defrost time have anything to do with the less airy dough. 3 hours doesn't seem a long time to get the dough back up to temp. I would normally give them 2 hours out of the fridge from just a cold fermentation.

From the videos I've watched they tend to advise taking them out of the freezer and placing overnight in the fridge, and then a couple of hours at room temp. They seem to still get an airy crust but they're pretty much professionals at it.

Hard to get my head around that Dough Bros advice. The idea that a longer cold ferment would require a shorter RT ferment is sound... but the RT ferment comes before the Cold in nearly all recipes.

While fermentation takes place when taking it out from the fridge, that stage is primarily about allowing the dough to get back up to a temp so that it's better/easier to work with. It's generally not classed as a fermentation stage if you get me.

With only 30mins out of the fridge, the dough would be hard to stretch and would struggle to hold its shape without wanting to spring back imo.

I've done a fair bit of experimenting, and I'll probably continue to do so, but for the moment I've settled on a 2hr bulk ferment, individually ball and do anything from 24-48 hour cold ferment. Taking them out at least 2 hours before making. I just find it the most convenient (no real work required on the day - there's enough to be doing baking them) and results are very good.

The one thing I've really noticed is that there can be a big difference in what is RT. In a poorly insulated home in the middle of winter, it involves me cosying them up snug near a fire.

I really thought that 6 months in, everyone would be selling off their little used pizza ovens.

But almost 3 years later, it seems that people are still as into it as ever. Fair play.

I can't remember the last time I made pizza - much simpler times before anyone knew the words "percentage hydration" and "leoparding". I did do a long, cold fermented, though!

yeah theyre definitely not a gimmick and they are here to stay. I think its because of the quality of pizza you can produce from them by using recipes available online, its on a par with what you would get in a good pizza restaurant. And it beats take away too as its not lying in a box steaming itself for 20 minutes before consumption. And then the cost, Dominoes now charging 22 euro for a medium sized pizza whereas with the Ooni you can produce better quality pizza for less than 2 or 3 euros. Plus kids love pizza and getting involved making the dough and helping to cook it.

I’ve been obsessed with pizza for about 18 years. I think I could eat it everyday but I’m sure I say that about a lot of food.

Got a 9.2/10 tonight from one of my son’s friends. Mrs G! wanted to know where the .8 went. 🙄

Yeah sorry Doh 🙄 (excuse the pun) I use the calculator mostly because of time, amount of pizzas etc. It's great for that but I just throw it all in the mixer, bulk prove and ball it an hour or so before it's needed.

I was convinced that my purchase of an ooni was an impulse buy that would end up housing spiders in the shed - but to my surprise, it's used at least every other week. Makes top notch pizza. The headache of making dough isn't as much of an ordeal once you find a method / recipe that you are happy with. And now paying foe itself by saving me paying eye watering charges for takeaway pizza!!

Multiply the weight of flour by 0.6 ie 1000gr of flour equals 600 gr of water. But 60% hydration is a very tough dough, try 66% should be easy to work and add the last of the water slowly in small increments.

Can I ask if anyone has any advice to stop pizza from sticking to the peel while cooking? Using the ooni koda, but find when I stretch the dough out it always sticks to whatever it’s on. We were originally using a wire cooling tray to put the pizza on and into the oven, but it kept sticking to the wires. So we got a perforated pizza peel, thinking that would solve the issue, but the centre of the pizza is still sticking to the peel. We are using lots of flour to dust the peel before putting the pizza on, and have tried oil too, but we’re still having the same problem having to scrape the center of the pizza off the peel. Any advice would be much appreciated!

Use flour and a wooden peel

dust it with flour or semolina, pull the pizza onto it once built. Stretch it out a bit once on the peel, give it a little shake to ensure it’s not sticking. Peel all the way into the oven. Use the metal lip at the back for a guide. At a slight angle pull it out in a quick movement. Can always use the pre cooked bases you see in the shops for practice at first.

also don’t worry I still have the odd one stick after a few years of making pizza!

I use semolina on a metal peel and hardly ever sticks. If you leave it sit on the peel for too long before launching it will start to stick. Don't overload the toppings either. As mentioned, give it a little shake on the peel before launching to be sure it's moving freely. If not, you can lift one side of the pizza and blow under it to free it. I find Stadler Made on YouTube does some good videos.

multiply the amount of flour by 0.65 ie 600 grams flour equals 600x .65 equals 390 grams water. The main thing is not to worry about it being sticky coming out of the mixer, scrape it out into a rough ball on counter and spread some olive oil on top and leave covered for 15 to 20 mins then lift and fold lift and fold. Watch the Vito video it doesn't matter how sticky it is initially the method works and you will form a nice tight ball to prove.

Tetra pak lid from litre of milk snaps on perfectly underneath the lid!

That looks pretty good