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WHEN EXECUTED WELL, pizza is surely one of the most sublime yet simple pleasures in the food world. Crisp and soft dough topped with a combination of tangy, stringy and herby ingredients eaten by hand surrounded by family and friends – well, it doesn’t get much better than that.
You can easily head to your favourite pizzeria or order in, but have you ever considered making pizza at home?
Being able to make pizza at home is one of those rudimentary skill sets that every cook should at least try to master. Ultimately, making pizza from scratch is not difficult but it does require a modest investment of time and there are a few little quirks that could trip you up on your quest to making pizza at home – the temperature of the kitchen you’re working in, the quality of the flour you’re using or the heat of your oven all play a part in what kind of pizza you end up making.
We sought the top tips of some of Ireland’s finest pizza purveyors to help you plan your next pizza party and ways to avoid the potential pitfalls of pizza making. Though some of their tips varied, everyone we spoke to broke down their advice into five slices; dough, sauce, toppings, oven and attitude.
“The dough is the foundation of everything,” says Ronan Greaney of Dough Bros in Galway. “We stick to traditional Neapolitan style of flour, water, salt and yeast. Time is a big factor when making the dough.”
Greaney suggests making your dough and kneading it for 20 minutes, then letting it sit for between 3 and 6 hours at home in a warm spot covered by a damp tea towel over to keep it moist. Once it doubles in size, you need to knock the dough back, roll it and cut it into dough balls about 150g each. Let those dough balls prove for another 1 or 2 hours at least, and then roll the pizza out by hand or using a rolling pin.
White recommends letting the dough balls prove over night before rolling them out. If you’re having a pizza party on the weekend, why not make the dough a couple of days before?
Reg White of PI, Dublin’s newest pizzeria, also recommends a slow prove. “Reduce the work but increase the time,” he says. “Do your dough overnight. There’s far less labour involved but it takes a longer time, and it’s an infinitely nicer dough. Take any recipe and reduce the yeast down and let it rest longer. That way, your end product doesn’t have tonnes of yeast, leaving you feeling stodgy. For me, the dough is what’s really going to make your pizza stand out – it’s the most important part of the pizza.”
Some pizzaiolos, including the team at Sliced in Cork led by Josh Hanlon, recommend that you always using fresh yeast. If you can’t source fresh yeast, get the best dried yeast at your disposal. It makes sense that starting with the best ingredients will ultimately lead to the best dough, so keep that in mind when sourcing the water, yeast, salt, and, perhaps most importantly, the flour.
“Get the best flour you can get,” recommends Emma Gray of Gaillot et Gray, a French-style pizzeria in Dublin 8. A Type 00 flour is recommended for best results but there are also great recipes for gluten-free bases using gluten-free flours or vegetable bases such as cauliflower.
“You can also buy pre-made bases,” says Gray. “Pizza is all about cooking together – it’s for sharing, for enjoyment. Our whole ethos is that pizza is for sharing with other people, so if buying pre-made bases helps you to relax and enjoy the company of your friends and family, then go for it.”
For those who love a tomato sauce, Paul McNerney of Paulie’s Pizza in Dublin 4 has a few words of advice. “At Paulie’s, we only only San Marzano tinned tomatoes. To make our tomato sauce, we crush them by hand and season with salt and pepper – that’s it! If you can’t get San Marzano, buy the best tinned whole tomatoes you can find. Empty two 400g cans into a bowl, sprinkle about 10g of salt and a good few twists of pepper into the bowl, and crush with your hands. You can also buy bottled passata in your local supermarket or food store.”
Greaney at Dough Bros is also a fan of San Marzano tomatoes. “It’s about getting the balance right,” he says. “It shouldn’t be too acidic or too sugary sweet. A good quality passata can be closer to where you want your sauce to be.”
Don’t feel obliged to top your base with a tomato sauce. Try a pizza bianco style, which omits the tomato sauce in favour of letting the toppings speak for themselves, particularly if tomatoes don’t match the flavour profile of those toppings. For example, if you want to make a potato, rosemary and bacon pizza, you might want to be generous with some brie cheese as a sauce substitute. Or if you want to feature wild mushrooms, using a light ricotta as a sauce balances perfectly with the flavour of the mushrooms without overpowering them.
It’s a given that sourcing the best ingredients that you can get will have an enormous impact on the final product. “Don’t skimp on the cheese,” says Greaney of Dough Bros, “and don’t use grated cheddar. The cheese is really important It’s such a key component.”
McNerney of Paulie’s Pizza recommends going with the best Italian ingredients you can get your hands on – tomatoes, Parmesan, mozzarella and olive oil.
He has a top tip when it comes to using mozzarella. “If you’re using buffalo mozzarella,” he says, “dice it up a good few hours before you’re going to use it, or even the night before if possible. Pop it into a colander over a bowl so that the excess water drains off the cheese. That means you avoid a wet and soggy pizza.”
There’s often a temptation to pile all of your favourite things on to your homemade pizza but our experts all learn towards minimalism in this regard. “Less is always more when it comes to toppings,” says Hanlon from Sliced Pizza in Cork. “Keep it simple to get the full flavour.”
It’s all about the heat. Restaurants have been built around wood-fired pizza ovens that have been flown in from Naples. While it’s not impossible to have a wood-fired oven in your back garden, it’s fair to say that most people making pizza at home are doing so in a domestic oven. It’s vital that you can get that oven as hot as you can get it. Your average oven can reach about 250 degrees celsius.
“Pre-heat your oven to 250 degrees for thirty minutes,” says Hanlon of Sliced in Cork City. “It needs to at a very high temp to ensure perfect pizza. 280-300 degrees is the ideal temperature!”
You can use a thin metal baking tray drizzled in oil and sprinkled with flour to avoid the dough sticking to the tray. Some people recommend pre-heating the tray and then transferring your pizza with toppings on to the hot tray, while others recommend assembling your pizza with its toppings on the tray to avoid a bit of a messy transfer situation. Experiment at home and see which one you prefer.
To help reach that higher temperature, a pizza stone is worth investing in. “To get a really springy dough,” says White from PI Pizza, “a thermal mass is needed. Most domestic ovens can’t get quite hot enough so the pizza stone helps. You want to use top and bottom heat, as opposed to fan heat which can dry out the dough.”
Depending on how hot you were able to get your oven, your pizza shouldn’t take any more than 10 minutes to cook. The ideal time would be 5 minutes, and that’s where a pizza stone might help. If you are able to achieve a really hot oven, that can reduce your cooking time leading to a springy dough and moist toppings.
The beauty of homemade pizza is that there are a number of ways of doing it “right”. Experiment with a few trusted recipes. Find a method that you like, and one that works within your kitchen and equipment. The first time you make pizza, it might be worlds away from the quality of your favourite pizzeria. But that’s OK.
“Don’t be afraid to fail,” says McNerney. “You might make a balls of it the first time you make a dough but you’ll learn from your mistakes. Experience and practice really helps. It can be about the touch and feel, and getting to know the temperature of your kitchen and how dough reacts to that. People expect their homemade dough to come out of the oven looking like an ad for an Italian restaurant. If you use good ingredients and give it time and love, the pizza will taste good – even if it looks terrible.”
Watch YouTube videos on how to roll out pizza dough by hand. Read plenty of recipes to figure out what approach you might like to take. Experiment with different types and brands of yeast. Do you want to assemble your toppings on a pizza stone or do you want to use a pizza peel to transfer your assembled pizza onto a hot baking tray or stone? Will you go for a tomato sauce or a bianco? The beauty of pizza making is that it’s not an exact science. There are a number of factors which come into play so it’s about taking advice from experts and using that advice to find your ideal pizza recipe for your home.
Remember, you’re cooking for yourself, your family or your friends. Part of the joy of pizza is that it’s a very communal thing to make. “Don’t take it too seriously,” says Gray of Gaillot et Gray. “Enjoy it. Have fun with it. Experiment. Get everyone involved from grandparents to kids to next door neighbours.”
After quite a bit of experimentation, and only one major failure, I’ve come to depend on the below recipe for my own pizza-making adventures. Mine is a short prove, designed for people who want to make the dough on the same day as the pizza party.
This recipe, particularly the amount of yeast used, can be adapted for a much longer prove – and all the experts say that a longer prove yields a better dough so that’s definitely worth keeping in mind. Do an online search to find the best method for a longer prove dough recipe, and then pick up this recipe where the toppings come in to play.
Ingredients
Method
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In the words of nelson…HA HA
@Chutes Idiot: ask what cian likes ha ha
@Chutes Idiot: Why don’t these people join Hamas or the Ukrainian Army if they really want to progress their political agenda. Playing childish pranks won’t change anything, but at least it’s safe for them!
@Chutes Idiot: Projecting on to Brendan doesn’t really help you, you know that right?
@Clare Power: Not funny in any way. I’m not a fan of Trump, but this type of behaviour is unacceptable, regardless of who owns it or motivation. Same applies to the people who destroyed the pitch in tuam stadium. It’s a felony.
@Diarmuid Concannon: so…I care not a jot for your opinion
@Clare Power: That’s where we differ because I do care about yours and I do like your honesty.
@Diarmuid Concannon: those poor holes in the ground, you care about the planet?
@Diarmuid Concannon: read between the lines…I don’t approve of breaking the law but it’s a little tiny dig at Trump…
@Clare Power: Boom Boom… see what you did there…(although, you probably didn’t)
@Willie Murphy: ah Willie.. I just did…very good…not intended
@Housing Hunger Games: To qoute Clare, I don’t think you give a jot about my opinion, but just in case you do..I care about the thoughts or motivation of these people, not necessarily the damage because these people will do it again and again for frivolous reasons, and then you have people on here ,just as bad as the perpetrators, cheerleading.
@Diarmuid Concannon: you ask about the motivations of people putting a hole in the mud but not the motivations of people putting a hole in people?
@Clare Power: How very woke. How very far-left. Toys out the pram when the simpletons don’t get their way. Muppets.
@Clare Power: Woke tr@mp.
@Kieran Conroy: oh dear…are you all mad because I replied to another of your comments and made a show of you….silly baby
@Clare Power: Exactly WTF are you chatting bollox about libtard?
@Chutes Idiot: no joy just sorrow that he missed!!
@Kevin Byrne: well that seems to be a common thread for you, threatening children…
Jonny 40 accounts be upset, rian / jim / chutes joe willis / mary / cian cormac
@Housing Hunger Games: You can almost telepathically feel them shaking in anger.
@Housing Hunger Games: These protestors are a disgrace. Ashocking disrespect for the rule of law. Who do they think they are? Enoch Burke?
Funding Genocide upsets right thinking human beings
@Kevin O Brien: there is no Genocide, there is a jihadi terrorist attack on the sovereign stste of Israel.
@Kevin O Brien: South Africa was trying to change the definition of genocide to attack Israel in the international criminal courts. The only people wanting to commit genocide are Hamas against the Jewish population of Israel.
@frank dowling: Another article today with another organisation labelling Israeli action as genocide. Do you not accept the UN’s account of these incidents? Seems like you don’t believe in the rule of law when certain countries are involved
@Sam Walsh: 200 Israelis dead, 46,000 Palestinians dead. But yea, Israel are the good guys. By the way, in WW2 there was a crowd in Germany who had a similar, but less murderous tactic. When 1 of there own was killed, they’d kill 50. Israel copied the plan, but have adjusted the numbers of revenge murders upwards.
Stormy Daniels Double Ds done the damage
@DC: i blame that drag queen Erin Go Bra-less.
If these protestors love Gaza and Palestine so much then better for us all if they just eff off and go live there.
@Gerry Lamont: they can’t be gay or unmarried living in sin or more nonsense from a book of fairytales
@Gerry Lamont: if you love those holes in the ground being attacked then go live in them
@Gerry Lamont: why should they? They pay taxes for your dole.
Great stuff, and shame on all the people who work for that fascist at his golf club.
@Jacintha Dumbrell: at least they work
@Jacintha Dumbrell: they have a job that feed their family d.ass
Big shout out to the security staff, they were fairly on the ball there.
Nobody saw that coming, especially after one of Trump’s other golf courses was vandalized only days before over in Scotland. Who would have guessed it could have happened here?
@Chaotic State: You know how big golf courses are? You’d do well to keep an eye on the whole thing.
@Chaotic State: good cian ;)
Rabbits maybe?
@bruce banner: quite possible, all them bunnys around here carry Palestinian flags around with em’
@bruce banner: Playboy bunnies. It’s Trump.
@bruce banner: Actually it was the snails that live there and are protected. They stopped the big extension plans he had.
I would happily vandalise that deranged tangerine sex offenders golf course.
@Daniel Skelton: is that you Melania?
@Daniel Skelton: alleged
Could not have happened to a more deserving billionaire POTUS
Crybaby lefties are still sore over losing the election
@common sense: goddamn lefties just as bad as righties, least they not far righties
@common sense: Not sore enough to break into the capitol and shit all over the place like you guys did.
Anyone seen Melania?
What tools. Don’t realise the amount of local employment the resort gives
@Dr Albert S Meinheimer: Yes, I guess tools were needed to dig the holes, and they also provided employment for the local people, as someone had to fill them in again, so spare your faux outrage
@Dr Albert S Meinheimer: Buggar all local employment in the grand scheme of things. Also it gave the same employment before he bought it and it’ll give same after he bankrupts it and someone else opens it.
@Tony: the complex couldn’t be given away at the time. He bought it and employed over 110 locals
@Larissa Caroline Nikolaus: as a woman you must understand sarcasm
Leftist tolerance in action!
@Paul: those tolerant lefties putting a hole in the ground while the righties put a hole in people
@Housing Hunger Games: trumps policies have put a big hole in people’s pockets that’s for sure
I see those pro-Hamas thugs are at their nonsense again. These people are disgraceful cowards and it’s moments like this that I support bringing in caning as a form of punishment like they have in Singapore for those engaged in vandalism and public destruction. These people hate the idea of Trump’s excellent plan for Gaza because Hamas would be kicked out and wouldn’t be able to launch terrorist attacks against Israel and fire rockets at their citizens. These people are antisemitic to the core. It’s this government’s virulent anti-Israel stance that has emboldened these dirtbags. It’s only a matter of time before synagogues and Jewish businesses are vandalised as well. They already openly chant antisemitic slogans and wave Hamas/Hezbollah flags in the streets. Strong deterrence is needed.
@William Jennings: Nobody is pro Hamas you tool. But sure you know that but your job is to write your muck
@William Jennings: OK William, let’s say trump’s “excellent plan” for producing a middle eastern riviera has materialised. Are you going to holiday there now…? On the soil of a former people’s bloodstained land that nethy & the idf cleared way by murdering 50000 innocent lives(20000 children) masquerading as revenge for oct 7th attacks? Will you still go William?
@Tony: Get your head out of the sand, you absolutely dope. Of course these people are pro-Hamas. They wave Hamas flags and chant antisemitic slogans. They call for the destruction of Israel and vandalise the private property of Donald Trump after he called for Hamas to be removed permanently from Gaza so they can no longer commit massacres against Jewish people like they did on October 7th when they tortured and murdered 1,200 innocent people. What other proof do you need? Are you a Hamas-loving Islamist too and is that why you can’t see the truth if it punched you square between the eyes?
@William Jennings: Some eejits dug up greens on a golf course. So they must be anti-Semitic. That’s some leap.
@j m m: If Gaza is successfully modernised by America and terrorism is fully rooted out, I will have no problem going there and I’ll happily sip my margarita by the beach. 50,000 “innocent” people have not died. 18,000 of them were Hamas militants, 6,200 of them were patients with stage 4 terminal cancer that Hamas falsely added to the death toll and 10,400 of them have no ID or proof that they were even real people. 20,000 children have not been killed, even Hamas doesn’t claim that number. Back in May, Hamas were forced to change the number of women and children killed from 24,000 to 12,800. Therefore, the number of children killed is likely around 10,500. Every single one of those deaths is on Hamas, who deliberately build their missile launching sites beside schools and hospitals.
@Brian O’ Leary: They planted Hamas flags on the golf course and wrote anti-Israel slogans just like the vandals did up in Scotland. I would absolutely consider their behaviour, as part of a long pattern, to be antisemitic. The fact that they did this because they opposed Trump’s plan to remove Hamas members from Gaza so that they could no longer commit terrorist attacks against Israel is very telling.
@William Jennings: Yep, that’s the reply I expected. Nice statistics too, are they idf produced stats? William, like you, nobody on here supports hamas. We’re all pro human(I hope). Nobody here holidays in graveyards either.
@j m m: My statistics are rooted in factual information. The Henry Jackson Society, the Wall Street Journal and all the UK and US intelligence agencies have done comprehensive analyses which confirm this. Even if I decided to get my statistics directly from the IDF, so what? Would you trust the Allies or the Nazis more when it came to an accurate picture of the death toll during World War II? You seemingly get your statistics from the Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry based on your highly inflated numbers and the fact that you claimed that Hamas militants counted as “innocent” civilians. Do you classify ISIS and Al-Qaeda militants in the same manner when they are killed? I’m pro-human as well, which is why I support eradicating terrorism in Gaza and removing Hamas from there permanently.
@William Jennings: I based my comment on what I read in the article: “It is not yet known if those involved in the vandalisation are linked to any protest groups.”
@Brian O’ Leary: This article obviously hasn’t been updated yet. The Irish Independent said that these people committed the vandalism for the exact same reason as the vandals did up in Scotland.
@j m m: whilst we live in Ireland with the blood of millions of our innocents
@William Jennings: His plan is ethic cleansing, similar to the plantation of Ireland. It’s horrendous.
@William Jennings: He called for the removal of all people. Any Palestinian.
@William Jennings: There is a big difference between being anti Israeli government and anti semetic. Which you choose to ignore.
Emotional lot those lefty’s, always causing murder when they’re not happy with
things.
@Eric Gaffney: holes in the ground is murder? Wait until you hear about Palestinians, Israelis, Ukrainians, Russians but you probably only get emotional over the ground being attacked
@Housing Hunger Games: There you go getting overwrought about a comment.
@Eric Gaffney: far righties crying over a few holes in the ground lol bloody snowflakes and karens
@Eric Gaffney: Not as bad as the time you guys smashed your way into the Capitol building and shit all over the place.
@Dan Ryan: the only holes those incels will ever get.
@Dolly Mounted – Norside Drag Queen: you’ll literally only get holes.
No not a golf course even if it is trumps.
The left are childish, I’ve never heard of anyone who supports the other side burning and damaging property all over the country and now around the world. A bunch of people with teenage brains in adult bodies.
@brendan C5: The “other side” is turning an entire enclave into rubble as we speak so that kind of upends your argument
@brendan C5: CAPITAL HILL
@brendan C5: And along comes agent C5, who ironically supports putin doing a lot more than just “burning and damaging property”.
@Clare Power: a handful of people the majority were peaceful. At least they didn’t burn cities and private businesses and caused billions in damage the last time he was in power.
@Darth O’Leary: no it’s not, wake up.
@Eugene Burns: and what did Ukraine do for 8 years to east Ukraine before Russia stepped in. Learn your history.
@brendan C5: not all history comes from Sputnik and Tass you know?…. or maybe you don’t.
Vandalism is Vandalism
Childish carry on.
Hm. I have a funny idea this incident would be described differently had it been against property of an Irish politician.
@Athena: more people would have laughed about it and the usual crew would say they deserved it as they are evil and corrupt
I find the angst funny
Had to go to the comments section, then the BBC and, God help us, Instagram to discover that there was a Palestine / human rights / protest angle to the story… Journal.ie appears to be presenting it as an apolitical act of destruction.
Or maybe they hadn’t the full details at time of writing. If so, article could do with an update. https://www.instagram.com/share/reel/BAXjrRjsm5
Why is Mic
Why is Micheàl Martin’s name in the sub heading written without leading capital letter?
@Luan Willis: why have you spelt his name with the French accent grave instead of the fada?
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