Busting the Mythical Pizza Experts

Last night, at the ungodly hour of 2:30 AM, I found myself wide awake, staring at my phone. I know, I know. It’s a terrible habit, and I’m working on it. But sometimes, the allure of twin cats farting is just too damn strong.

I stumbled upon the Pizza Dough Addicts Facebook group, a haven for pizza enthusiasts. A seemingly innocent question was posed: “What’s better – longer bulk fermentation or ball fermentation?” Simple enough, right? Wrong. The ensuing chaos was enough to wake the dead. A horde of self-proclaimed pizza experts descended upon the post, spewing forth a torrent of half-baked opinions and pseudoscientific nonsense.  Rather than try to go back to sleep, I decided to look at the profiles of the dirty fucks who gave answers. A bunch of them had awful pizza photos on their page, and some of the worst offenders had great-looking pizzas on their page.

It’s like these guys think they’ve got a PhD in pizzaology or something. Just because they can slap together a decent pie doesn’t make them experts. It means they followed a recipe that works for them without knowing why. And suddenly, they think they’re qualified to answer all things pizza. Guess what, pizza question answerer, you don’t know shit.

One “expert” claimed that bulk fermentation is better for bread, while ball fermentation is better for pizza. Go fuck yourself. First of all, all pizza is bread. Not all bread is pizza.  Pizza dough depends on many factors, including temperature, humidity, flour type, and personal preference.

Another expert started lecturing us on how a long RT (Room Temperature) bulk makes for a more sour taste and stronger gluten structure than a long, slow bulk CT (Cold Temperature). It makes sense because he was from Australia, and everything there is backward. Everywhere else in the fucking world, you’re going to get a stronger gluten structure with a CR (Cold Retard), making the dough easier to stretch and handle. With a long RT bulk, unless you know exactly what you are doing, you run the risk of over proofing, leaving you with unwanted focaccia dough.

Here’s my point. Just because someone makes pizza for a living doesn’t mean they know any of the science about what makes great pizza dough. If they would finally realize there is more than one way to skin a turd, they’d be one step closer to taking control over their dough. So next time you see some “expert” spouting off on one of these Pizza Groups, take it with a grain of Semolina. Or better yet, ignore them completely and go make your own fucking pizza.