Hey Jan,
If you’ve ever gone to stretch your dough and had it tear on you -
Whether it’s a small hole in the center or the whole thing just falls apart, I know firsthand how frustrating that is.
And the natural reaction is always the same, be more gentle with the dough, add more flour, maybe slow down.
But none of that actually fixes what's broken.
When the dough tears, it usually comes down to one of two things:
- Either the gluten isn’t developed enough…
- Or the dough hasn’t had enough time to relax before you try to stretch it.
Both of those are process problems, not recipe problems - which is something that took me a really long time to figure out.
And this is actually one of the biggest topics I cover in Pizza Dough Mastery
In the workshop, I make the same dough and split it into two batches -
One that I ball up right away after a short bulk fermentation, and one that I leave in the fridge for two days and ball the morning I bake.
Same recipe, same flour, same hydration, same everything.
And the difference was kind of amazing.
The short-bulk dough was slack, hard to keep round, and a lot more likely to tear or end up with thin spots.
Whereas the long-bulk dough is stronger, easier to handle, and ends up with this light, airy, bubbly crust that honestly looks like a completely different recipe.
I also walk through the balling and stretching techniques that I picked up working at a wood-fired pizzeria.
Things like how to properly close off the seam on your dough ball so you don’t get a crater in the middle, and the slapping technique that lets you stretch the dough out without touching the center at all.
These are things I really couldn’t find anyone teaching online and had to learn by watching the pros do it and getting my own reps in.
You also get my dough troubleshooting guide, which covers pretty much every issue you might run into during the dough-making process and how to fix it.
Pizza Dough Mastery closes for good on Friday at midnight EDT, so if dough handling has been the thing holding your pizza back, then this is the last chance to grab it:
>> Click here to get Pizza Dough Mastery while it's still open
Talk soon,
Charlie