4 1/2 cups Flour
1 tsp Salt
2 packages Dry Yeast
1/4 cup Olive Oil
2 Tbsp Light Brown Sugar
1) In 1/2 cup of warm (110 degree) water, stir in sugar, and dissolve yeast. Let stand 5 minutes
2) Sift flour and salt, pour onto work surface forming a well in the center to pour the wet ingredients
3) Pour 1 cup water, and 3 Tbsp olive oil into the well in the flour, then add yeast yeast mixture.
4) Mix with hands, drawing flour into wet ingredients until blended.
5) Knead for 8 to 10 minutes (use a timer or you'll cheat) adding flour as necessary.
6) Oil a bowl, and let dough rise 1 1/2 Hours
This dough is the dough that makes "Hoeffel Pizza" the most extraordinary pizza on the planet! Brought to us by Thomas Hoeffel, who tought us how to make real pizza. See comments for a funny story about this dough, and how I rediscovered dough and pizza/bread-making.
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Thomas and Linda and I met during grad-school at Carnegie-Mellon in Pittsburgh. Thomas invited us to his apartment for pizza, he said "bring your favorite pizza ingredient." We brought anchovies. I told Linda, "Not anchovies, no one likes anchovies." When Thomas saw the anchovies he said something like "you're my kind of people!" We went to the kitchen to find every other imaginable pizza ingredient (Now remember, this was the 80s so the world of imaginable pizza ingredients was smaller than it is now). Thomas had spent the morning shopping in the Strip District (Pittsburgh people will have to explain that one). At the Parma Sausage Company he got the best looking italian sausage (sweet and hot), and pepperoni. He got beautiful fresh mozzerella and provolone, red yellow and green peppers, fresh olives, mushrooms, and garlic (and of course our anchovies). Thomas also had a special pizza sauce from a recipe by his dad (we've yet to pry that one out of Thomas). He already had the dough underway, and we spent the next few hours listening to music, and slicing mounds of vegetables, slicing pepperoni and browning saussage, sauteing the vegetables, and making the finest minced garlic. We then constructed a masterpizza that started with Sauce, fresh garlic, cheese (more than you think you'll need) and layers of ingredients. This was the 80's and it was the first time I'd seen a pizza-stone (which thomas had in the oven) let alone a deep-dish pizza-stone in the shape of a pie-pan.
Let me just say, Man-O-Man was that some unbeieveable pizza! So later, I told Thomas, "you're coming to our house to teach us how to make this pizza, we'll get everything this time, just show up and tell us what to do." We planned a Hoeffel pizza party, and invited 8 or 10 others. We did all the shopping this time, and Thomas showed me how to make the dough that's in this recipe. We made the first two pizzas, and put them in the oven. After about 10 minutes Thomas and I simultaneously noticed the two mounds of cheese sitting on the cutting board. We had forgotten to put cheese on the Pizzas! We pulled them out of the oven, and added the cheese on top of all the other ingredients, and cooked until the cheese was bubbly. We let the pizzas rest for a few minutes while we prepared the next two. Once the other two were in the overn we served our guests, and went back to the kitchen to have a beer, and add the cheese to the top of the next two (a new pizza method had been born).
The second set of pizzas came out looking as good as the first, and when we came out with the second round, our living room looked like the Sharon tate house after a visit from the Manson family. People were sprawled on the couches and on the floor, totally done in by the first two pizzas! It was hilarious! I've never seen people so totally mowed down, our guests were in a Hoeffel-pizza induced food coma. It was great! Thus, the legend of Hoeffel pizza was born.
The second story comes many years later. Thomas and I sproadically talk on the phone; both of us have gone on in our careers, but like any of the "best old firends" we talk and pick up right where we left off. So, we were chatting, and I told Thomas about a cooking mishap I recently had. I had bought some pre-made dough at the store to make pizza, and it was just the worst. It had no rise, and it cooked into a resilient slab of dry-wall with sauce and cheese on it. A total disappointment. "What went wrong?" I asked.
There was a pause on Thomas' end of the phone, and then came classic Thomas. "Scott, I showed you how to make pizza dough. It's really not that hard. You know? What are you doing buying dough at a store?" Shame, approbation, and just the kick in the ass I needed to rediscover the joys of home-made pizza made from home-made dough. We had been making pizzas with pre-made Bobolli crusts, and I thought that buyig prepared dough was a real treat. Where had we gone so wrong? It was a hilarious Thomas moment, and something I haven't had the chance (until now) to thank him for. There's been no turning back, and we've made misshapen pizzas in the shape of every state in the union (and in the profile of several former presidents as well). But they always taste great, and we've mowed down our share of house guests over the years. "I can't believe you fit all those ingredients on ywo pizzas!" Much fun, try it, it's really not that hard. You know?
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