New York-style pizza at home, v2.0
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This is an update of a video I posted a yearago about how I try to make New York-style
pizza in a home kitchen. I'm going to showyou how my technique has evolved over the
last year, and also try to explain thingsa little better than maybe I did the first
time, including what this style of pizza actuallyis.
Start with the dough. Yes, I normally makemy pizza dough in a stand mixer, but I will
never cook in a stand mixer on the internetagain, because I don't want people to get
the impression that they need something soexpensive to make good food. You don't. All
you need is a bowl — ideally a big bowlwith a wide base.
These days I start by putting in all my water— about two and a half cups of warm water.
Then some sugar — a tablespoon. Some peoplemight say that's a lot. I don't think that
it makes the dough taste sweet. It does, however,help the crust brown at home-oven temperatures,
which are gonna be lower than professionaloven temperatures. That's our main challenge
here.
In goes a teaspoon of active dry yeast. Mixthat up, and let it sit for five minutes.
Give the yeast a chance to rehydrate and toeat some of the sugar in there and to be fruitful
and multiply. This is called blooming, andit is not necessary. The dough will rise regardless.
The reason people do this is to check to seeif their yeast is still alive, and guess what
— this was dead. Look: no change. I've beenworking from this jar of yeast since my first
pizza video year ago, and this yeast is nomore. It has ceased to be. It's expired and
gone to meet its maker.
So let's try this again with fresh yeast.You wait a few minutes and then here's my
favorite part, I am not speeding up this footage.This is real-time. I love that. OK, now I
am speeding it up.
Gonna put in a some olive oil. Maybe that'stwo tablespoons or something? Some pros don't
use oil in their dough. Again, I think thatit helps the crust brown in a home oven. Then
in goes a tablespoon of salt. Some peoplesay that will kill the yeast. That is a myth,
as you shall plainly see. Certainly with enoughsalt and enough time you will kill the yeast,
but this will not.
Now flour. I use bread flour, which has ahigher protein content than all-purpose flour.
You can use all-purpose, it just won't bequite as chewy and stretchy. There's even
higher protein flours that you can buy onthe internet, but this is in every American
grocery store. I start with five cups, byvolume. Sure, that's not an accurate way of
measuring flour, but this is just a startingpoint. I'm gonna add more flour by feel as
we knead.
I usually just bring that together with aspatula or something, then get my hand in
there and knead. You can take it out and kneadon the table, of course, but with a nice wide
bowl like this, you can keep the mess entirelycontained in the bowl. I'm just gathering
it together then pushing down with the weightof my body behind my palm.
When it gets so sticky that I can't reallywork with it, I'll sprinkle on a little bit
more flour — as little as possible, though.I really prefer wetter doughs these days.
They bake up lighter and crisper. The onlydownside is they're sticky and hard to work
with. So, I'm adding the minimal flour tokeep it workable.
The test to see if it's ready is to see ifyou can stretch out a patch of it really thin
without it tearing. That is not ready yet.By the way, some pros would say if you're
gonna use oil in your dough, you should addit at this stage, rather than at the beginning.
They say you gotta let the flour hydrate firstbefore you introduce the fat. The problem
with that is that it's hard to kneed oil intoa dough that's already gone smooth and elastic
like this, especially when you're kneadingby hand. I've done it both ways, and I think
the texture of the finished product is virtuallyindistinguishable. I just don't think it makes
a big difference in a dough this lean.
Alright, I've kneaded this for 10 minutesand I can stretch it thin without it tearing.
This is enough dough for four home-oven-sizedpizzas, so I've got four containers here,
big enough for the dough balls to double insize. I'm pouring a little olive oil into
each.
Then you could use a scale to divide thisinto four equal balls, or you could do what
I usually do these days which is to tear theball in half, then heft each ball for weight.
If one feels heavier, transfer some doughto the other ball. One of those goes back
into the bowl, then we do the same to this.Tear it in half, heft the balls for weight,
then it's time to shape them reasonably smoothand round. The shaping doesn't really matter
so much with a wetter dough like this, becauseit's just gonna kinda go bleeegh into the
container no matter what we do.
Then what I do is use the ball like a paintbrush to oil the inside of the bowls. In the
process, the balls themselves get good andcovered in oil too. Very efficient system.
The oil helps to keep the balls from dryingout, which is especially important if you're
gonna keep these in the fridge for up to aweek, as I do. It also helps you get them
out of the containers later, and the thickcoating of oil on the surface, again, helps
the crust brown at home-oven temperatures,because oil is such an effective thermal interface.
Cover them up, and then you could either risethem for a couple hours and bake them, or
what I do is throw them straight into thefridge. Some people rise them at room temperature
for a bit before refrigerating, I think thatmakes almost no difference, and this way you
can just throw them in and forget about them.I make my dough when I'm not hungry, and then
after at least 24 hours cold rise, these areready and I can bake one super easily and
quickly whenever I want. They're already portioned.
Though, I do think these basically get betteras they age in the fridge up to a week. I
have a whole video about that, which is linkedin the description.
OK time to bake. You need a hot surface tobake on, and I have recently switched from
a stone to a steel. I have video that systematicallycompares the two; it's also linked in the
description. The steel is simply more thermallyconductive. It would be too thermally conductive
for a 1000-degree wood-fired oven, but fora home oven it's perfect. I've recently started
putting it on the second-highest rack position.I find that's best for browning the top, but
every oven is different.
You wanna get your oven as hot as it goes,though. For me, that's 550 Fahrenheit on the
convection roast setting. And I will pre-heatmy steel for a full hour. You could do less,
but this gets me a noticeably browner, crispiercrust, and electricity is absurdly cheap here
in America.
OK, now cheese. One of the things that makesthis style of pizza different from say Neapolitan
pizza is low-moisture mozzarella. If you usefresh mozzarella, you can only use a little
bit of it, otherwise your pizza will becomesoaked in whey. That's why Neapolitan pizza
only has splotches of cheese. New York pizzahas a solid layer.
Part-skim low-moisture mozz is very easy tofind, but the whole milk version tastes a
lot better, and it's much harder to find.I used to be able to get it molded into sticks
— Galbani string cheese. That was a painto unwrap, but it was a good cheese.
Now they only have the part-skim kind at mystore, so I'm struggling to find a replacement.
There is this whole-milk, low-moisture mozzfrom Walmart. It is not a great cheese, but
it's the right style. I will say, beware ofthis cheese from Polly-O, which a lot of people
like for pizza, but this cheese they sellretail is not what I would call a true low-moisture
cheese. It's basically medium moisture.
Look how much smoother the Polly-O is comparedto this Walmart cheese. Look at how much squishier
it is. When I taste them, not only is thetrue low-moisture cheese on the left noticeably
drier, it is also tangier, which is key.
Polly-O does make good whole-milk low-moisturecheese for pizza, but only in these big 7.5-pound
loafs for commercial use. This is a differentcheese from what you'll find in the grocery
case, though they might have it at your delicounter. Honestly, if you live in a bigger
city you'll probably have plenty more goodoptions than me. This Walmart cheese is what
I've got today.
It's one pound. I tend to do about 7 ounceson my pizzas, so this is a little more than
what I need for two pizzas. And then, crucially,I'm gonna put it back in the fridge after
I grate it. I have found that, in my ovenat least, if I keep the cheese cold, it's
less likely to overheat and squeeze out anorange grease layer before it's had the chance
to brown in the oven.
OK now, sauce. The New York-style pizza thatI'm talking about here is a street food. It's
cheap. It's generally made with canned sauceproducts — a popular one with New York joints
is Full Red, which only comes in #10 cansfor commercial use. That's almost 7 pounds
of sauce.
This right here, far and away, is the closestthing to that stuff that I can find in U.S.
grocery stores: Pastene Kitchen-Ready crushedtomatoes. Really good. It's very strong — I
don't have to supplement it with tomato paste.I do put in a pinch of sugar, some dried oregano
and a lot of olive oil. I love fresh oil inpizza sauce, but you do you. There's enough
for like four or five homemade pizzas in a28 ounce can. I've just mixed up enough sauce
there for one pizza.
The key thing is to not cook this sauce beforeit goes on the pizza. Canned foods are already
cooked a little — canning requires heat.If you cook your sauce any more than that,
you're likely to loose the brightness thatis key to this style. You end up with a flavor
that reminds me more of lasagna than of pizza.
Here is my pizza peel. You need somethingbig and flat to shimmy the pizza out onto
the steel. I used to do it with a sheet ofcardboard back in college. You need a granular
matter to keep it from sticking, and I'm backto using cornmeal. I know I said that I don't
like the grittiness, but, I dunno. It's traditionalin my mind and for some reason I just like
that, even though I don't really like that.
Now what I do is put a plate on there, andthen some flour on the plate. I pull the dough
straight out of the fridge. I do not warmit up before I work with it. This is a very
wet dough, and the cold helps keep it workablystiff. I take it out while deflating it as
little as possible, and then get it coatedin flour. I didn't used to do this step, but
again, wet dough — gotta keep it from sticking.
And yeah, I know how to toss pizzas in theair. I still prefer to just do the gravity-stretch
method. I just go around the edge formingthe thick cornice while letting the rest of
the dough fall and stretch out naturally.This is, most significantly, cleaner than
tossing it in the air, I think it gives youa little more control, and no, it does not
give you a perfect circle like centrifugalforce does, but guess what, I don't want a
perfect circle. I want an oblong.
A characteristic of New York-style pizza isthat it's wide — wide enough to give you
foldable slices. And it's basically as thinas you can get it. In a home oven, I can bake
a wider, thinner pizza if I just let it beshaped like an oval.
Sauce goes on, smoothing it out with the backof a spoon. I generally feel that if I've
put on a little less sauce than is my instinctto put on, then it's gonna taste perfect.
You gotta remember how thin this is. For flavorI think it's key to sprinkle on a little grated
parmesan under the mozz layer. Some New York-styleplaces do this, others don't. I think it adds
a lot, and you can still put more on top laterif you want.
Then the mozz. I find if I start by sprinklingit around the edge first and then work my
way in, that gives me the most even distribution.Again, if it feels like not quite enough to
me, that ends up being just right.
Then very quickly, before this dough bondsto the wood, bring it on over the oven. A
little shimmy just to make sure it's gonnarelease, and then shimmy it out onto the steel.
A pizza this thin in an oven this hot cooksreally fast, 6 or 7 minutes. It's a game of
chicken with the cheese. I want to wait untilI've got as much color as possible but right
before it starts to over-heat and squeezeout its fat.
Rather than taking the pizza out with thepeel, I usually grab it with tongs and pull
it straight out onto a cooling rack. The mainreason I do that is so that I can be building
the next pizza on the peel while this is baking,but I also think this is a little cleaner,
and I definitely like to rest the pizza onthe rack. It keeps the crust crispy.
When it's cooled down a bit, it's solid enoughto cut cleanly. I honestly don't think pizza
cutters are good tools for the home, becausewhen you use them on a little home cutting
board like this, they're likely to fall offthe edge and hurt your table.
For a pizza this size, a good ol' chef's knifeis a perfectly adequate tool and it's safer
— it gives you more control. Now, look athow brown the bottom is. You can even see
some leopard-spotting there, like they getin the wood-fired brick ovens. I've never
achieved that with a pizza stone in a homeoven; only with a steel.
That's really tasty. It's the taste I grewup with, and if you make your dough in advance,
it's a pretty easy weeknight family meal.Now if, after all that, you've got pizza on
the mind, might I suggest going on Audibleand listening to Sasheer Zamata's comedy special
Pizza Mind, which you can do for free.
"At first she was like, 'I want you to bringhome a God-fearing man.' And then years went
by, and I didn't bring anyone home. And shegoes, 'I want you to bring home a man.'"
No, it's not about making pizza — she usespizza as a metaphor. But anyway, I love her,
and I love how Audible allows me to make funor productive time out of lost time — like
when I have to do the dishes after a shoot.
Whether it's comedy specials or books, Audiblehas the world’s largest selection of audio
entertainment — including Audible Originals,which are stories created exclusively for
audio. Whether you're driving around, or hittingthe gym this time of year as I am, Audible
can keep you entertained, informed and inspired.Anytime you can't read, you can listen with
the Audible app on any device. Start listeningwith a 30-day Audible trial. Choose one audiobook
and two Audible Originals absolutelyfree. Visit audible.com/adamragusea or text
adamragusea to 500-500. And get Pizza Mind.Will my pizza process continue to evolve?
I'll let you know in a year.
Thanks to Audible for sponsoring this video! Start listening with a 30-day Audible trial. Choose one audiobook and two Audible Originals absolutely free: http://audible.com/adamragusea or text adamragusea to 500-500. It's still possible to make NY-style pizza at home, though my technique has changed of late. For reference, here's my first pizza video, from a year ago: https://youtu.be/lzAk5wAImFQ My video about how dough changes as it ages in the fridge: https://youtu.be/o4ABOKdHEUs My video about pizza stones vs. pizza steels: https://youtu.be/UWVEgoEGnkY ***RECIPE, MAKES FOUR PIZZAS*** For the dough 2.5 cups (600 ml) warm water 1 tbsp sugar (15 ml) sugar 1 tsp (5 ml) active dry yeast 2 tbsp (30 ml) olive oil 1 tbsp (15 ml) kosher salt 5 cups (600g) bread flour, plus more for working the dough Cornmeal, semolina flour, or coarse-ground whole wheat flour for dusting For the sauce 1 28 oz (828 ml) can crushed tomatoes (I like Pastene 'Kitchen Ready') 2-4 tbsp (30-60 ml) olive oil 1/4 tsp (1g) sugar 1/2 tsp (a fraction of a gram, I don't know) dried oregano For the cheese 1 tbsp (15 ml) grated parmesan or pecorino cheese 7 ounces (200g) whole-milk, low-moisture mozzarella, freshly grated Start the dough by combining the water, sugar and yeast in a large bowl and let sit for a few minutes. If the yeast goes foamy, it's alive and you're good to proceed (if it doesn't, it's dead and you need new yeast). Add the olive oil and salt and 5 cups (600g) of bread flour. Mix until just combined, then start kneading. Add just enough additional flour to keep the dough workable (i.e. not too sticky) and kneed until you can stretch some of the dough into a thin sheet without it tearing. Divide the dough into four equal balls and put them in four containers (ideally glass) and lightly coat the balls and the interior of their containers with olive oil. Cover, and either rise at room temperature for two hours, or put them in the refrigerator and let them rise for 1-7 days. (I prefer the long, cold rise.) When you want to bake, put a pizza stone or pizza steel into your oven (mine works best on a high rack position but every oven is different) and preheat to your highest possible temperature, ideally convection, for a full hour. For the sauce, simply mix together the ingredients. Liberally dust a pizza peel with cornmeal (or something similar). Take the cold dough out of the fridge and dust it in flour. Stretch to the widest size and shape that will fit on your peel and stone/steel. Top with just enough sauce to lightly coat the surface. Dust the sauce layer with parmesan, then cover with the mozzarella. Transfer the pizza to the stone/steel and bake until the crust is well-browned and the cheese has browned a bit (but, ideally, has not started oozing out an orange grease layer), 6-7 minutes.