Yield: 4 x 8 inch pizza

Ingredients

100g fed sourdough starter

375g water

10g salt

2tb/30g olive oil

500g pizza flour (the 00 type)

Method

First mix the starter, the water, the olive oil and the salt in a bowl. Then mix in the flour. Stir and knead until you have a beautiful dough ball. Transfer to (an ideally see through) bowl and leave somewhere nice and warmish for about 30 minutes.

Then we start to stretch and fold, at least 4 times, in 30 min interval (2h). Then cover it, mark the level of the dough (I use a sliver of a sticker) and return it to that nice and toasty place we spoke about where it should rest between 6 - 12 hours. Once the dough has about doubled, our marker will help us with that, the dough is ready for further handling.

Flour a work surface, plop it out, briefly work it (careful not to be the end of them wonderful bubbles) and split it into four parts. Flour four containers, make each part into a brief boule, and put it in there. Afterwards, fit it with a loose lid or foil.

Now the dough should slow ferment in the fridge between 6 hours and 3 days. 3 days is my favourite because you really get that beautiful sourdough flavour :)

While you can also handle the dough straight from the fridge, it will not be nearly as enjoyable. I always pull it out about an hour before baking, flour the work surface, plot it on there, flour it minimally and cover with the towel.

Then I crank up the oven to max (250 in my case), prep the stone/tray (I still also use baking paper that I lightly oiled and then wiped with a paper towel). Now the stretching. Everybody has to find their technique and there is a ton of videos on Youtube from people much better than myself, so give it a go (I have now learned to throw it between my wrists/palms and it is super fun).

When stretched and on the stone, cover it with sauce of your choice and stick it in the oven for 5 minutes (if you put all the topings to begin with, the pizza will not bake through). Then pull it out, add everything else, and bake for further 9 minutes.

Now, every oven and everybody's taste is different, so we each have to figure out the details but I GUARANTEE you that the taste of this pizza crust is unbeatable.

Buon appetito!