As a follow on from my previous post where I outlined a really simple but authentic pizza dough for those that simply want a "same day" to "mix and go", this is for those happy with a touch more effort and wishing to use a proper biga previous day starter. It is pretty much what they do in Naples. Use 00 Italian flour if you can, but don't worry if you can't. Sorry it hasn't formatted more elegantly. It shows item, grams and percentage.

In summary it shows what you add on the second day to a roughly 400gm biga mix of 100% hydration with a few grams of yeast with what to add the following day to maintain 64% hydration of a total dough of 1000gm. 64%'ish seems to be the accumulated view of a perfect level of water to flour for pizza mix but adjust yourself to what you can handle and like. The more water you can cope with basically the better. I currently use doughballs matured in the fridge for at least a couple of days but often a week or so old. In broad summary the longer it takes to mature the dough the better the taste. The less yeast you use the longer the maturation. Bread is really easy .... if you forget recipes and just get the hang of hydration percentages. If you forget recipes and understand the really easy principles it releases you to experiment with different flours and ingredients to produce loads of different type of breads without stress or strain but bags of fun.

I maintain similar spreadsheets for all my breads including the new bread in the "eating today" forum. I then just make adjustments as I learn and improve.

Poolish / biga is the French or Italian name for a yeast starter made a day or two earlier to develop and improve the taste of bread. It's what gives baguettes their taste and pizza dough it's taste. It is easy and worth the very small amount of effort.

So for four or five pizza balls:

Day 1. Make biga - 200gms water 200 gms flour a few grams say 4 or so of yeast NO Salt ... salt kills yeast. Just mix roughly with a fork .. it doesn't need to be neat and can be lumpy ... no need for any effort. This biga takes a few seconds but improves pizza and all bread exponentially and in my view is nicer than sourdough ie more character but no sour and no palaver with maintaining starters etc. Leave the poolish/biga overnight in your mixing bowl to save extra washing the following day with a hotel shower cap over to keep dust off. Even better, can be done two days ahead with slightly less yeast and allowed to mature and ferment even slower and it'll be even better. All my breads starts with this poolish/biga ie bagels, baguettes, country, etc etc Bread is easy.

Day 2 ... or 3 .... Add the rest and mix for 10 minutes by hand or 5 minute or so machine . Put a hotel shower cap over top to protect. When roughly doubled in size, portion into either 5 balls of 200gms (small pizza) or 4 balls of 250gms (big pizza) and put into lightly oiled bowls with lid into the fridge until needed. Use floured surfaces and don't use any other oil except in storage bowls.

If you can use preferably semolina (or if you only have polenta - that'll do) under the final stretch of dough before you top, then this under your dough will stop it sticking and give a better crispness under your pizza in a hot domestic oven to be closer to a hotter pizza oven.



Completed weight 1000
Hydration 64%


Dry 610
Liquid 390

Dry 100.00%
Italian Flour 392 64.30%
Poolish Flour 201 33.00%
Salt 16 2.70%
Total 610

Wet 100.00%
Water 191 49.00%
Poolish Water 199 51.00%
Total 390



Enjoy your pizza and report progress back to the thread.