Pizza - commercial cooking

[Boots]

mmm. Ok... Heaven forbid I have found myself in the cooking section!!

Daughter number two is going into business. She is a whizz in the kitchen and loves anything to do with cooking, and I have absolutely NO IDEA where she got this odd interest from. Being an enterprising little soul, she has decided she is going to get mum to run her pizzas all through the bush on Friday and Saturday nights.

Menus have been laid out, that mum now has to cost out.
Boxes and heat bags have been sourced, that mum now has to pay for.
Flyers have been designed, that mum now has to print.
Shopping list has been made, that mum has to fill.


A few questions for those a little more in the know...

Can I add extra shelves to a domestic oven?

Does anyone have an easy (repeat: easy) crispy dough recipe?

Are there any tips or tricks of the trade anyone can pass on?

Am sure there is more stuff....

Anyway, any thoughts, tips etc heaps appreciated!

[bazil]

get a buisiness loan if you think its a cooker....and a winner....and spend the money on good kit for the job

[The Chili Monster]

Boots wrote:

mmm. Ok... Heaven forbid I have found myself in the cooking section!!

Know the feeling ...
Wish I could help ... toppings, yes ... bases - a definite no

[Boots]

get a buisiness loan

mmm. Have this little thing I try to teach the kids...

if you can't build something, it was never worth borrowing for in the first place.

[Shirley]

http://www.fool.com/community/pod/2003/030512.htm

Couple of recipes here and hints and tips too!

Good luck to daughter number 2!!!

[Muddypause]

Can I add extra shelves to a domestic oven?

It depends how many runners you have in the sides of the oven, and whether you can get more shelves to fit them. I guess you could hang some slightly smaller shelves on wire hooks from the shelf above. Or how about making your own custom mud oven. That could be a selling point.

Anyway, any thoughts, tips etc heaps appreciated!

Make sure the price includes delivery, and I'll have a 9" Margarita with extra sweetcorn and no garlic bread, please.

[Cheezy]

For really crisp base you need to be putting the pizza's onto a hot surface (like in Italy straight into a wood oven), you can get a pretty good effect using pizza stones. They are just ceramic flat squares that you heat up to temp in the oven then put the pizza straight onto. The advantage to these apart from crisp bases is that at full temp (ca. 280 degC in my fan oven) I get pizza's cooked in 4 mins!, which is about the same time as the wood ovens I've used in Italy. (though without the great wood flavour)

When using pizza stones you pre make the pizza then have to transfer it onto the stone.(I use a baking sheet, but you could invest in a paddle) To stop it sticking you should use semolina flour (polenta at a push if you can't get it.), as they do in Italy.

This is the best stuff to stop your pizza's sticking, however it also adds a great crunch to the base, and so I put alittle into the recipe as well.

Recipe
1Kg strong flour
660ml warm water
28g yeast
28g salt
28g honey/sugar
1 table spoon olive oil
Semolina flour for dusting, knocking back, prooving plus a little into the mix.
This will make four 12" thin base pizza's easily.

It's a high yeast recipe, you can use a lot less, if you give the dough more time. I don't pre plan my pizza making so I'm usually trying to get it double in size ASAP.

I'm a bit of a traditionalist when it comes to toppings the ol K.I.S.S approach.

I've seen loads of recipes to do with the tomato covering, loads of time spent cooking etc. But for simple freshness you cant beat getting a tin of good chopped tomatoes, draining it completely of juice(and squeeze it as well) and using the toms. Then add mozerella and basil, job done the perfect margeretia.

[Wormella]

I can recommend getting hold of Jeffrey Steingarten's 2nd book -It must have been smoething I ate

He goes into some depth about making the perfect pizza

[Andy Hamilton]

what about usingNev's solar oven or even making a few that way you would not even have to pay to cook them and perhaps even have a unique selling point - unless you have that already with being the only one selling pizza in your area. Might get the press interested and free advertising never goes admiss.

[Stonehead]

You could try Pizza for Blokes...

Make up a batch of damper dough, flatten it out into a rough circle, throw some stuff on it (bloke stuff - so meat, cheese and sauce!), then throw it on a piece of weld mesh supported on some bricks. Apply a blow torch to the bottom first, then the top.

Make and eat after about six tinnies...


And yes, someone of my acquaintance really did do this - the same bloke who drove his VW Beetle under a road train but survived with a scalping because he was so drunk he was slumped at the wheel!

[Boots]

Thanks for givng me heaps of great ideas for making pizza bases it was a great help. I'm going to try the recipe this weekend but mum is still finishing the wall so I dont think I will start on a oven any time soon but thanks for the idea. Stonehead the best I have on my menu is an aussie pizza which has home grown bacon and eggs I have booked you and muddypause in for next friday and your delivery fee is $5000 but this is a new delivery guy and he is worried it might not be hot enough so please give him a tip when he gets there. Bye the way the pizza is only $13. I have made seven pizzas so far they are pretty good as long as mum stays out of the kitchen.

Does any one else want to order a pizza before there all gone.
From daughter number 2 (slippers)

[Wombat]

Put me down for one with the lot!

Nev