This same-day dough is the answer when you wake up in the morning and decide you want pizza for dinner. Good call. Me too.
Bulk fermentation: 2 hours.
Divide, shape and cover dough: 10 minutes.
Second fermentation: 6 hours.
Hold time for use at room temperature: 4 hours, or refrigerate to extend the use until the next evening.
Sample schedule: Mix the dough at 9 a.m., knead it at 9:20 a.m., shape it into dough balls at 11 a.m., make pizza between 5 p.m. and 9 p.m. For next-day pizza, refrigerate the dough balls 4 hours after they are made up, then leave them out at room temperature for 1 hour before making pizza.
Measure and combine the ingredients: Using your digital scale, measure 350 grams of 90 to 95 degree water into your 6-quart dough tub. Measure 15 grams of fine sea salt, add it to the water, and stir or swish it around in the tub until it is dis- solved. Measure 0.3 gram (about 1/3 of 1/4 teaspoon) of instant dried yeast. Add the yeast to the water, let it rest there for a minute to hydrate, then swish it around until it’s dissolved. Add 500 grams of flour to the water-salt-yeast mixture.
Mix the dough: Mix by hand, first by stirring your hand around inside the dough tub to integrate the flour, water, salt, and yeast into a single mass of dough. Then using a pincerlike grip with your thumb and forefinger, squeeze big chunks of dough, tightening your grip to cut through the dough. Do this repeatedly, working through the entire mass of dough. With your other hand, turn the tub while you’re mixing to give your active hand a good angle of attack. Then fold the dough back into a unified mass. Continue for just 30 seconds to 1 minute. The target dough temperature at the end of the mix is 80 degrees; use your probe thermometer to check it.
Knead and rise: Let the dough rest for 20 minutes, then knead it on a work surface with a very light dusting of flour for about 30 seconds to 1 minute. The skin of the dough should be very smooth. Place the dough ball seam side down in the lightly oiled dough tub. Cover with a tight-fitting lid. Hold the dough for 2 hours at room temperature (assuming 70 to 74 degrees) for the first rise. This timeline is flexible, so if you need to do this after 1 hour or 1-1/2 hours, don’t stress, just make up your dough balls a little early and add the difference in time to the next stage.
Shape the dough: Moderately flour a work surface about 2 feet wide. With floured hands, gently ease the dough out of the tub. With your hands still floured, pick up the dough and ease it back down onto the work surface in a somewhat even shape. Dust the entire top of the dough with flour, then cut it into 3 or 5 equal-sized pieces, depending on the style of pizza. Use your scale to get evenly sized dough balls. Shape each piece of dough into a medium-tight round, working gently and being careful not to tear the dough.
Second fermentation: Place the dough balls on lightly floured dinner plates or a baking sheet, leaving space between them to allow for expansion. Lightly flour the tops and cover airtight with plastic wrap, and let rest at room temperature for 6 hours for the second fermentation. Alternatively, you can rest the dough balls for 4 hours at room temperature, and then refrigerate to hold for up to the next evening.
Make pizza: Without refrigeration, the dough balls can be used anytime in the 4 hours following the second fermentation. If you refrigerated the dough balls, let them come to room temperature for an hour while you preheat the oven and prepare your toppings.
Notes: This dough was inspired by the Associazione Verace Pizza Napoletana (AVPN) pizza dough rules, with my adaptations for the home kitchen. It uses the same salt and yeast percentages as the AVPN specification (they require fresh yeast, and here we use instant dry yeast at one-third the weight of fresh yeast) and a similar timeline. After mixing, the dough rests for 2 hours. Then dough balls (panetti) are made and set aside, covered, and held at room temperature in their second stage of fermentation for 4 to 6 hours in Naples; Neapolitan pizzerias are warmer than a lot of American home kitchens, so I’m suggesting a 6-hour development in this recipe. The dough balls are ready to make pizza anytime following the second fermentation and hold for 4 hours at room temperature. The dough will be a little gassy, very easily stretched, and a little delicate near the end of its 4-hour hold time. To extend the dough balls’ life span, you can refrigerate them once they get to a soft, malleable state after the end of the second fermentation. Let cold dough balls warm up at room temperature for the 45 minutes you spend preheating the oven.
Nutritional analysis is for one dough ball.
