HM Pizza - making in advance

superrhinos

I have done a quick search of the forum and was unable to find the answer to my question.

Is it ok to make hm pizza dough in advance? If so is it best to wrap it cling film and put into the fridge before rolling out? thank you

lostinrates

superrhinos wrote: »

I have done a quick search of the forum and was unable to find the answer to my question.

Is it ok to make hm pizza dough in advance? If so is it best to wrap it cling film and put into the fridge before rolling out? thank you

You can make dough in advance.:). In Italy you can buy dough in containers from fridge section a little like the plastic ones supermarkets here sell croissants in or plastic takeaway Ones. It continues to grow, even in the fridge, though not much, . I'd put it in a Tupperware I think. Certainly keep in fridge.

How long in advance are you hoping to do it?

Soworried

I'm making pizza bases today for the freezer.

For the base
375g of bread flour
125g of wheatgerm If you have no wheatgerm just use 500g of bread flour. I add the wheatgerm for health reasons.
teaspoon of salt
tablespoon of sugar
a 7g sachet of yeast
2x tablespoons of oil or butter
300ml warm water

Mix and kneed for a few minutes. Leave for 10-15 minutes then kneed again and split in to 4.

Roll out to the best shape to fit your trays, I make 2 rectangles that fit together on my large baking sheet

Par bake for 5-6 minutes, then I freeze them and top when I need a quick dinner or use as garlic breads with cheese

These bases really are life saver to me with the hours I work. I can have a dinner made that everybody loves within 15 minutes of being home. I always have at leat 4 in the freezer:)

superrhinos

Thanks both for your replies. I am planning to only make 4 or 5 hours in advance of using them.

lostinrates

superrhinos wrote: »

Thanks both for your replies. I am planning to only make 4 or 5 hours in advance of using them.

No problem.

Elisheba

Yeah, the dough fine in the fridge. For morwe than a day or two though I would freeze it.
A good little money saving trick is to buy the big bags of breadmaking yeast - Doves is the easiest one I can find, although I think Hovis also do a jar. Wait***e do them, and Sain*****s have them in there 'Free from' section for some reason. Much better value than the little sachets. You can open the bag and keep in a jam jar to keep it fresh.

lushlifesaver

Soworried wrote: »

Par bake for 5-6 minutes

don't do what I did once and freeze without par baking - my dough kept growing and broke the tubs I had it in in my parents chest freezer but we didn't know for a while and it was awful to clean up afterwards!


Soworried - do you use the bases straight from the freezer?
I'm tempted to make up some smaller 'snack size' ones and it would be great if I could freeze the bases par-baked then just whack on some toppings and cook in the oven/combi for a little bit!

Soworried

lushlifesaver wrote: »

don't do what I did once and freeze without par baking - my dough kept growing and broke the tubs I had it in in my parents chest freezer but we didn't know for a while and it was awful to clean up afterwards!


Soworried - do you use the bases straight from the freezer?
I'm tempted to make up some smaller 'snack size' ones and it would be great if I could freeze the bases par-baked then just whack on some toppings and cook in the oven/combi for a little bit!

Yes, I just use them straight from frozen and they are lovely :T

lushlifesaver

Fab that's something for me to do on Saturday once I've brought doglet back from the groomers then :-) we have pack of pizza base mix in the cupboard so will use that

silverwhistle

The standard recipe for Italian pizza dough _requires_ it to be kept overnight in the fridge.. Times and recipes can be a cause for heated discussion amongst Italian pizzaoli.. :-) With the long proving time you don't need too much yeast either. Dough can also be frozen in balls and then defrosted in the fridge the day you want to use it. No need to pre-bake, but get the oven good and hot. I roll mine out on ceramic floor tiles left over from my kitchen job. I've also got an electric pizza cooker from Italy which gets to a really high temperature, which I use when I'm just cooking one for myself. It gets a nice crisp base, although my ambition is to get a wood-burning oven; other things have priority though!

Westywoodpecker

I know it's cheating, but we've just made our first pizza using Aldi's ready rolled pizza dough & very nice it was too! It also freezes well.