Here it is: another secret ingredient for fantastic homemade pizza--and you can’t buy it anywhere.1/25/2025 As you may know from hanging out here longer than is healthy for any sane human being, I have been known to peddle in secret ingredients for homemade pizza. Today is no exception. I’m going to share a secret ingredient that is free, in limitless supply, and impossible to buy. If you’re a seasoned home pizzamaker, this may not interest you. I don’t blame you if you bail out as soon as you discover what I’m about to say. This secret ingredient is something that I try to persuade every home pizzamaker to use. They often want a different secret ingredient, and they ask me, “Well, what do you think of X” or “How about if I do Y instead? I’m afraid there is no substitute for this ingredient. You can try, but the results will always be disappointing. And if you’ve been down this road yourself, you understand. The secret ingredient we’re discussing is a continuous progression of existence occurring in an irreversible succession from the past to the present and into the future. Or, as it’s more succinctly known in the vernacular: Time. There is no substitute for time when it comes to making pizza dough. And why is that? Time is magic. Time is opportunity. It gives yeast and flour a chance to do a little dance together. The yeast get busy in there, and the biochemical process that they initiate over time does something that cannot happen any other way. The process creates character and flavor. I periodically try an experiment with new dough recipes. I make a pizza after a 24- hour fermentation. It’s always a disappointment. It’s edible, but it lacks character and depth of flavor. The same dough, after a 48-hour fermentation makes a better-tasting pizza. But the pizza made after 72 hours of fermentation always tastes the best. I know people who swear by four- and five-day cold fermentation. I can’t say that my pizzas ever get better after day three. And by day five or so, the pizzas are losing their pizzazz. I once tried nine days. That dough ball was grim. It was gray. (Presumably from oxidation.) It was difficult to work. The resulting pizza was pale and overly chewy. There can be too much of a good thing. (See also: salt.) The secret to using time as an ingredient requires adjusting another ingredient: yeast. There are a lot of recipes for “pizza in an hour!” They don’t make a great tasting pizza. People who use those recipes with success must assume that this is the way homemade pizza is going to taste unless you have a special oven. For example, I was talking to a delightful woman who had tried my pizza. She said it was superior to hers. So I started asking questions about her dough. It seems her standard dough recipe uses only 60% as much flour as mine—but 450% more yeast. She also ferments her dough for 4 hours at room temp and then bakes pizza. Before I bake pizza, my dough ferments in the fridge for 72 hours. That’s a difference of 1,800%. Without knowing her other ingredient measures, I know that a) she’s using 500% of my quantity of yeast, b) she lets it ferment about 5% of my fermentation time, and c) she thinks my pizza outperforms hers. A cynic would say, “Correlation does not equal causation.” I prefer to think that she can taste the difference and wants to up her game. I told her to email me her recipe so I could look at it. She said, “I think I’ll buy your book.” (I didn’t argue.) At the end of the day, it’s just pizza dough. It won’t change the world. But if you follow best practices, it might make a pizza you really love making and other people love eating. And the joy that evolves around your dinner table, well, that could change the world--one pizza eater at a time. Less yeast. More time. Added joy. It’s what’s for dinner. ------- Want to make pizza in a way that's full of best practices? You'll find all the simple steps to homemade pizza magic right inside my weird and award-winning pizzamaker’s manual, Free The Pizza: A Simple System For Making Great Pizza Whenever You Want With The Oven You Already Have. If you’re just beginning your pizza-making journey, this book is a convenient place to start because it doesn’t force you to make any decisions beyond making a pizza. It’s simply a step-by-step guide for getting from zero to pizza and amazing your friends and family. Learn more right here.
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AuthorBlaine Parker is the award-winning author of the bestselling, unusual and amusing how-to pizza book, Free The Pizza. Also known as The Pizza Geek and "Hey, Pizza Man!", Blaine is fanatical about the idea that true, pro-quality pizza can be made at home. His home. Your home. Anyone's home. After 20 years of honing his craft and making pizza in standard consumer ovens across the nation, he's sharing what he's learned with home cooks like you. Are you ready to pizza? Archives
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