What type of flour makes the best Pizza?

📃 RECIPE Link(s):

📚 Videos & Sources mentioned:

USEFUL KITCHEN GEAR

Ooni Pizza Oven

⏱ TIMESTAMPS:
0:00 Intro
3:50 The 4 Bags of Flour for Pizza Testing
4:38 How is flour made?
5:24 Why is the extraction rate of flour important?
6:45 The 2 Problems with the Bran & Germ
7:54 What is an alveograph?
9:31 #1 DetroitStyle Pizza Experiment
14:04 Questions we still need to answer
14:56 What type of wheat is used for flour?
16:04 How does Gluten Protein work?
20:20 What is Ash Content?
21:30 What is 00 Flour?
22:30 Why is flour bleached?
23:45 What is enriched flour?
24:40 #2 Neopolitan Pizza Experiment

MISC. DETAILS
Music: Provided by Epidemic Sound
Filmed on: Sony a6600 & Sony A7C
Voice recorded on Shure MV7
Edited in: Premiere Pro

Affiliate Disclosure:

[gabriellephoque]

Thank you so much ! You are one of the first american cooking channel that takes care of adding information for europeans, with different standards it is usually difficult to stick to the recipe, and now I understand how to compare American and French flours! Very interesting take, and I hope it leads you to a more global appeal throughout Europe

[alexmcginness]

As a bread baker, this was fascinating. Would love a cookie video and a bread video too!

[frankieinthekitchen]

This video was exceptional. I'll be sharing. I owned a pizzeria for 24 years and still occasionally teach classes on pizza making. I've never heard this explained better. Great job 😊

[orangestudio]

Hands down, this is the most complete and concise flour guide on the internet. All these took me months to discover and learn, and you done it in 30 min

[EmilyStory]

I absolutely love the direction this channel has gone in. Really cool to see him finding his groove with his love of displaying and presenting data. Such an unusual gift that brings me so much joy whenever a new vid comes out! Thanks Ethan!

[ufoch]

love the fact that Ethan is passionate about food and his last name literally means "bread man" in Polish 🍞

[captaincole]

A year ago I grew my own wheat, milled it, and baked it into AP bread and I can tell you that I have never had better bread in my life. Maybe it was just my hard work talking but there was an almost sweetness to it that I can’t really describe.

[TabletPro]

I think you might be my favorite educator on YouTube. I typically have the same mindset. Why is something better? How much extra work is needed? Do I value the differences enough to do all the extra work? Is it STILL the better option or was that because of some variable that changed?

I LOVE your content. It's so transparent... not sure what the best word is for it. But you are open about any bias you might have, it's 100% non-pretentious which is a gift you have. So refreshing. Genuine thank you. I get to learn how to present better from watching your content, and learn the content. It's a great combo.

[MEDICIERIC]

I like how Ethan is slowly optimizing all of the components of pizza to create the greatest homemade pizza the world has ever seen.

First San marzano tomatoes, then parmesan cheese, now dough. Next up… mozzarella cheese???

[anamericancookinspain]

As a cook, these are the types of questions that are really important to explore and explain. Love your approach here Ethan, hope all is well. If you make it to Asturias in Spain and want to cook up some food, lemme know!

[hhblair]

I use the King Arthur 00 flour for pizza in our brick oven, mainly for the ease of shaping. The chew is good too and after watching your video, realized the slower browning is valuable too in hot ovens.

[mightyn]

I'd be really interested in seeing you explore which flour is best for cakes and cookies!

[MrFlo]

This has to be a series.
-Best Cheese
-Best Sauce
-Best Dough (based on flour)

Ultimate combo

[bigjonnumber]

Such a great video. I’ve been watching pizza dough videos for 5 hours and was starting to hate the internet due to the lack of science. Finally someone put in the time to actually teach their viewers.

[rpinarreta]

So called 00 pizza uses imported "Manitoba Flour" from the province of Manitoba in Canada. Manitoba flour is used to make the long-risen dough and is milled in Naples, Italy. Manitoba flour also contains a high concentration of protein.

[sleepyhead]

Wow this video must have taken so much work, between all the tests, research, cleaning up after each test, and then putting it all together into a coherent presentation. Great stuff!

[JackFrosthawk]

A bit further from on-topic, but I'd love a deep-dive on thickeners. Wheat flour, corn starch, rice flour, more obscure options like potato starch and sweet rice flour (that last one I'm especially interested in). How powerful they are as thickeners compared to each other, differences in mouthfeel or flavor, how well they hold up in the fridge or freezer, even roux versus slurry. I have a family member that's no-wheat-or-corn and I'd love to know what options there are for making gravy he can eat.

[SkinnyMidwest]

KILLER video, dude. I've watched probably 100 different "bread" focused youtube videos in the past 2 or 3 weeks and this one was by far the most informative and succinct. No time wasted. Love it. This video alone is my 1% improvement for the day. Thank you!

[CrippledMerc]

I’ve never used bread flour for pizza but I’m gonna have to try that next time. One of my favorite things to do with friends or family, and especially my nieces and nephews, is to have a “build you own pizza” night. It’s a lot of prep work but it’s fun to make a bunch of different personal pizzas and try out what others come up with, as long as they’re willing to share😂
Plus the kids love it. Most of them just go for a typical combination, but I’ve convinced a couple of the more adventurous nephews to do half their pizza as something they know they’ll like, and the other half as something new to try. It makes for a fun evening though!

[EelcoPeterzen]

Very interesting video. European here and I've been deep-diving into the world of flour myself for the past couple of years, in order to create the best pizza I can. So here are maybe some more rabbit holes for you.

When I went to Italy for a short trip to learn how to make pasta (nothing fancy, it was a holiday trip), the chefs I met all said that "typo 00" is, like you thought previously, based upon how fine it is milled. Of course, there could be a language barrier preventing me from learning the finer details. However, I have noticed that when making pasta dough with type 00, the dough is a lot softer and smoother, almost silky smooth, as compared to dough made with regular grocery store flour.
I'm a little surprised it's so expensive in the US, because it's like the standard flour they use in Italy. They use it in everything.

But "type 00" says nothing about how good it is for pizza dough. This indeed has to do with the protein and gluten in the flour. I noticed this when I found some type 00 flour in my grocery store, specifically meant for pizza, which gave me terrible dough impossible to knead into a round pizza, without tearing the bottom. (Still a tasty pizza, though)
Apparently in Italy they also have a W-value which indicates the level of gluten in the dough. The level of protein is related to the amount of gluten, but apparently it's not a direct relation. I don't know why yet. The type 00 flour that you used, Caputo Pizzeria, has a W-value of 260-280, which is strong and good for if you want to make the dough in the morning and the pizza in the evening. That same brand also has the "Chef" or "Cuoco" variety with a W-value of 300-320. Stronger and good to make dough that rests for 24 hours. Yeah, more gluten also means the dough can/should rest for longer. This also improves the taste from the yeast. That stronger dough can create a more airy, but crispy crust. You can also add a little semolina, which is yet another type of grain, to make the dough stronger and crispier.

Did you know that the Neapolitan pizza recipe has no olive oil mixed in the dough, but the Roman recipe does? I bake my pizza's in the oven on a pizza stone (although I'm looking to buy that Ooni). It turns out, pizza dough doesn't brown without fire, except when you mix in some olive oil. So if you bake them in the oven, go for that Roman recipe.

One thing I noticed when you were making the dough: try not to mix the yeast and the salt into the dough together. The salt will kill the yeast if its concentration is too big, so mix the yeast into the flour with some water, so it can already start, and add the salt last.