Now that I’ve gotten into making wood-fired pizza, I’m back to making dough on a regular basis. And more importantly for me, I’ve revived my mother culture to create levain which I use for all my dough now. Yeah, I know… Yeast is typically used for Italian breads, but there is nothing like the texture and flavor of a dough risen with a sourdough culture.

In doing my research on focaccia, like other Italian breads, there are various kinds depending on the region. This recipe is a sourdough riff on Ligurian focaccia which tends to be a thicker, puffier kind as compared to a Genovese focaccia which is thin like flatbread. Also, even though I list honey as part of the formula, I didn’t include it in my final dough because I baked it in my wood-fired pizza oven. And even though it is baked in a pan, I didn’t want to risk the sugar burning. However, if you’re baking in a regular oven, by all means, include the honey! Either way, it’s still delicious.

And finally, I wanted to add a little complexity to the flavor profile by using whole grain, fine ground semolina flour. The results were spectacular!

Formula

Final Dough

The final dough will fit in a standard 9″ X 13″ baking pan.

Make the Levain. Make a 1:5:5 levain; that is, one part starter to five parts flour and water each. If you make the levain the night before, you can let it ferment overnight on the counter, then mix the dough in the morning. If you want to do a same-day bake, once you’ve mixed the levain, place it in the oven with the light on and maintain a temperature of 78℉-82℉. This will favor yeast activity over bacterial activity.

Mix. In a small bowl, measure out the levain you’ll need, then add all the water to it and dissolve the levain. Add the honey and whisk to dissolve. Add the olive oil to this mixture (don’t worry, it won’t mix). In a separate, large bowl, combine all the dry ingredients and mix thoroughly to ensure even distribution. Add the liquid mixture to the dry ingredients and mix to a shaggy mass, making sure there are no lumps or dry ingredients. Scrape down the sides, cover, then rest for 10 minutes.

Bulk Fermentation, Folding. 2 1/2 to 3 hours. Fold the dough every 30 minutes in the first hour and half of bulk fermentation. By the third fold, you should have achieved a nice windowpane. If you haven’t, then do one more fold. Allow the dough to rest until it has almost doubled in volume.

Final Fermentation. Punch down the dough, shape it into a rough rectangle in the shape of a 9″ X 13″ pan. Place into the pan, then use your fingers to spread out the dough and distribute it evenly in the pan. Let the dough rest for 20-30 minutes. After resting, sprinkle flaky salt on top and fresh rosemary all over the top. Sprinkle good extra virgin olive oil over the entire surface, then dimple the dough to let the oil pool in the dimples.

Bake. In a conventional oven, bake at 450℉ for 25 minutes or until the top becomes a nice chestnut brown. If baking in a wood-fired pizza oven, the focaccia will only take about 10 minutes. Don’t let it get too close to the flame to avoid burning and turn the pan every 30 seconds to achieve and even bake. Like a Neapolitan pizza crust, you should get charred spots.

Remove from the oven. Spray or sprinkle more olive oil on top, then lightly powder with freshly grated Parmesano Reggiano. Let it cool for at least 15 minutes. It’s best when it’s warm!

My son who lives in San Francisco was telling me the other day that a trend with pizza in the city – at least with the places he and his fiancé frequent – is crust made from sourdough. I took it as a tacit challenge. Plus, I hadn’t used my starter in months, so it gave me an excuse to wake it up. And now that I’ve done it, I’m going to go Mandalorian and say, “This is the way!”

I got an absolutely incredible oven spring from this dough. And the trick to that was building up a super-active levain, one that doubled in less than two hours. With the pie above, though I laid my toppings almost to the edge, it popped up so much that it pushed everything in! The result for both pies was crispy skin and chewy crumbs.

Baker’s Formula

Final Dough

Make the levain. As I mentioned above, I built up lots of activity in my starter to where it peaked in less than two hours. This was a basic 1:1:1 levain using AP flour. Since I had to wake up my starter, it took me three days and a few feedings to get to this point. Technically, you don’t have to do this, but your levain should pass the float test, and not just pass it. It should float on the water like it’s Styrofoam.

Mix. When the levain is ready, dissolve it in the warm water until fully broken down. Add the flour and mix to a shaggy mass, making sure no dry bits or large lumps are left.

Fermento-lyse. Allow the mixture to rest for at least 30 minutes to hydrate the flour. Once that’s done, add the salt, and work it into the dough until you don’t feel any salt crystals.

Knead. You can knead by hand, but I just knead in my KitchenAid at speed 2 for 5-7 minutes to really develop the gluten.

Scale and Cold Ferment. Once you’re done kneading, scale out two 450g dough balls, then form them into tight balls. I shape them like I’m shaping mini boules. Place the balls in a well-oiled container. Then pop them in the fridge for at least 48 hours.

Final Fermentation. On baking day, remove the balls. They will probably have collapsed in the container. That’s fine. Reshape them into tight balls, then place them covered in a warm place to come to room temperature. This may take 2-3 hours depending on your ambient temperature.

Make pizza. There are so many different techniques out there, so I’ll leave it to you to find out how to shape and top your pies.

NOTE: If those dough balls are too large, you can easily half the recipe ingredients and make 225g balls that will make 10-12″ pizzas.

I finally got a pizza oven for my backyard kitchen, so of course I had to make some dough. I have been using a super-simple formula that works as a quick dough and for cold fermenting. It’s more along the veins of a Neopolitan-style dough, but I use King Arthur or Bob’s Red Mill bread flour as opposed to 00 flour since it’s more accessible.

Overall Formula

Final Dough

For the final dough, I make two 450g balls.

The process for this is simple.

Mix. In a large bowl, combine the flour, salt, and yeast until well-incorporated. Add the water, and mix thoroughly until no dry ingredients are apparent.

Knead. Knead the dough for 10 minutes by hand, or if you’re using a mixer like I do, run the mixer at medium-low (position 2 on a KitchenAid) for 5 minutes.

Alternatively, once you mix the dough, you can just put some plastic wrap over it and let it sit for 8-12 hours. But note that if you take the no-knead approach, if the weather is warm, I’d use half the yeast to keep the dough from over-proofing.

Bulk Fermentation (Quick Dough). Once the dough is kneaded, form it into a nice, tight ball and place it in a well-oiled bowl, seam side down. Cover with plastic wrap and allow the dough to double in volume. On a warm day, this can take less than an hour. Once it has doubled, divide it into two equal balls, and shape each like you would a boule.

Final Fermenation (Quick Dough).Transfer the balls to a parchement-lined sheet pan, cover with a tea cloth and let them rise for at least an hour. They should expand about 75%.

Bulk Fermentation (Cold Ferment). This is my preferred way. Once the dough is kneaded, immediately divide the dough into two equal pieces. Shape each into a tight boule and transfer them to a container that will give them room to expand. I use a couple of plastic ramen bowls. Cover the container(s) with plastic (I put my ramen bowls in a jumbo ziploc), then place them in the fridge for up to 72 hours.

The advantage of a long, cold ferment is that yeast activity is retarded, but bacterial activity isn’t. Organic acids are allowed to develop in the dough that will help with its extensibility but more importantly, add all sorts of flavor. The texture of the final cooked pizza crust also becomes airy and creamy.

Final Fermentation (Cold Ferment). Remove the balls from the fridge and place on a parchment-lined sheet. Cover with a damp tea cloth and allow them to come to room temperature. This can take a couple of hours. Technically, you can work with the dough right out of the fridge, but cold dough is incredibly difficult to work with and can easily tear.

Shape. Shape into pizza crust. The 450g balls will make 12″-14″ crusts. Here’s a great video on how to shape pizza dough:

I was reading a recipe I had posted months ago on making Telera Bread and how it is the bread for tortas. Thinking about tortas made me think about the various kinds of torta fillings and that made me think about carne asada. Then I realized that it’s stupidly easy to make so, I thought I’d share how to make it here.

What kind of meat should I use for Carne Asada?

Flank and skirt steak are the most suggested cuts to use if you look at recipes on the Internet. But frankly, you can use any cut if it’s thinly sliced. In the image above, I used thinly sliced top round or sirloin that I got from a Mexican butcher. But, if I had my druthers, I’d use skirt steak all the time. Unfortunately, that cut has become expensive as it has gained in popularity over the years. It used to be considered a cheap cut and could be had for the same price per pound as top or bottom round. That said, if you go to a Mexican market, look for arrachera. Sometimes you can get it for a reasonable price. Oh well… Let’s get into the recipe, shall we?

Citrus is the key!

The base of a Carne Asada marinade is citrus, which comes from the juices of orange, lime, and lemon. Some recipes call for the juice from one orange, one lime, and one lemon (1:1:1). But after a lot of trial and error, I prefer a tangier marinade, so I use a 1:2:2 ratio of orange, lime, and lemon. For two pounds of meat, you’d use one orange, two limes, and two lemons. You’d double this amount for every two pounds of meat you increase.

The Marinade

The amounts listed are for two pounds of meat

Mix all the ingredients except the meat and combine thoroughly. Add the meat and massage the marinade into the meat to ensure that all the pieces are well-coated. Marinate for one to six hours. The longer the better.

Grill the meat about 1 – 1 1/2 minutes per side – it’s quick. If you’re using skirt steak which is generally a little thicker than thin cut round steak, 1 1/2 to 2 minutes per side should suffice to get the meat to a medium-rare to medium doneness.

Slice the meat into small strips and cut across the grain if possible. Serve with roasted bell peppers and onions with tortillas or use as the meat for a torta.

I have a recipe for Sourdough Ciabatta that I wrote a couple of years ago, so I won’t go into the details of that. But it’s a great recipe and as you can see from the picture above, it’s the perfect platform for BBQ pulled pork sandwiches. So, what I will focus on here is making the BBQ!

NOTE: I’m assuming that you have a smoker of some sort. I have a Traeger Century 22, which is probably the smallest Traeger. It’s a Costco exclusive that my wife bought me for Father’s Day several years ago. Anyway, let’s get to it.

Amazingly enough, I’ve found that barbecuing pork is one of the easier – and more forgiving – meats to smoke. Or maybe it’s because I’ve loved grilling or barbecuing pork for so long that I just know it well. Here I’ll just share my technique.

Pork Butt or Pork Picnic (shoulder)?

You can use either cut for pulled pork. The cooking technique is the same. But personally, I prefer cooking the picnic for a variety of reasons:

1. There’s less fat in the picnic. That doesn’t mean there’s no fat. But there is less fat than in the pork butt. There’s still plenty of fat for flavor. Personally, I prefer the higher protein content of the picnic.
2. Because there’s less fat, the final texture of the meat when pulled will create those nice ropes of meat which I prefer.
3. And even after a long rest in a cooler post cooking, the meat will not get squishy. It will maintain its texture much better.

The picnic usually comes two ways. With the skin on, in which case I will normally cook it like a lechon over an open fire or charcoal; or, it will come without the skin. But I have found that when it comes skinless, the butchers typically cut it up into three-to-four-pound pieces. That’s okay, as the cooking technique is the same. But each piece must be tied with twine, so they cook evenly. The 18-lb picnic I just cooked yesterday was cut up into five pieces and I had to truss them up. It wasn’t a big deal. It took all of ten minutes to do it. The only inconvenience with the picnic being in five pieces was I had to take the temperature of each piece individually. But that didn’t bother me.

Rub

I make my own rub that consists of a bunch of different spices. But you can use whatever rub you’d like. Just make sure that you’re generous with it and that the entire surface of the meat gets some rub. Some folks rub mustard on the meat first so that the rub will stick. i do this most of the time, but it’s really not necessary. I didn’t have any yesterday and just applied the rub directly on the meat.

Cooking

1. I set my Traeger to 250℉ and let it warm up for about 20 minutes before I cook.
2. Once it’s up to temp, I place the meat in the center of the rack or, if I have several pieces like I did yesterday, I make sure they’re evenly distributed on the rack.
3. I insert the Traeger’s probe into the meat.
   NOTE: A lot of people complain that the Traeger’s probe isn’t accurate. That has not been my experience. But what I have found is that you have to get the probe in the right place. To determine that, I use an instant read meat thermometer to get the initial temperature, then I place the probe in the same hole, at the same depth. The most variance I’ve seen from the instant read is three degrees. Why not use the instant-read thermometer all the time? Simply because I don’t want to open the lid unless it’s necessary, like spritzing.
4. I spritz the meat every 30-45 minutes for the first few hours with a mixture of 25% apple cider vinegar and pepper 75% water. After that, I spritz it every hour. This helps the meat absorb the smoke and helps with creating a nice bark.
5. Once the meat reaches an internal temperature of 165℉, I wrap the meat in butcher paper. I do this with both the picnic and the butt. I know there’s a lot of debate around this subject but I’ve been doing this for years with great results.
6. I place the meat back on the smoker, then use my instant read thermometer to find the sweet spot, then replace it with the probe.
7. I cook the meat until it reaches an internal temperature of 203-205℉.
8. Once the meat has come to temp, I immediately transfer it, wrapper an all, to a jumbo Ziploc or Hefty food storage bag. Then I put the bag in a cooler for a long overnight rest. I’ve gotten the best results with a minimum of a four-hour rest. But when I BBQ a picnic, it’s best to go a lot longer to ensure a full cook as it will continue cooking in the cooler for several hours.

So, for yesterday’s barbecuing, I cooked eighteen pounds. I put the meat on the rack at noon. I wrapped it at 7pm, and it came to final temperature at just after 10pm, then I transferred the meat to my cooler. I pulled it apart at 7:30 this morning. My final yield was about 11 lbs (yeah, you lose a lot during cooking). I put 6 lbs in the freezer for pulled pork sandwiches that I’ll make next Tuesday for a homeless shelter. I traded 2 lbs for a couple of jars of honey from a beekeeper friend, then kept 3 lbs for the family. It was a successful cook!

Today, I made a sourdough ciabatta (pictured above) and made a wonderful pulled pork sandwich with stinky Camembert cheese (if you can find Le Chatelin, it’s the best and the most stinky, yet flavorful Camembert). I sauced the meat with a light Kinder Gold BBQ sauce. It was spectacular. Sorry, I don’t have a picture of the sandwich because I forgot to take one. 🙂

While many know me as a baker, people who’ve known me for a long time know me as someone who loves to cook all sorts of things besides bread. And close friends know that I love to grill and smoke meat. I regularly make carne and pollo asada; love to prepare chicken in a variety of ways; grill and BBQ fine steaks; and every year at Christmas, I BBQ a whole Prime Rib. Last year, it was an 18-pound A5 Wagyu!

But despite all my experience in cooking meat, one thing I hadn’t done in all my years of cooking was beef jerky. Holy shit! After I made a batch yesterday, I was kicking myself for not making it much earlier. Instead, I was filling pockets of Jack Links and Pacific! 🙂 But now that I know how to make it, I’m going to make it often.

For the batch I made above, I used a basic soy sauce and brown sugar marinade with a bunch of spices: Seasoning Salt, Cumin, Black Pepper, Red Pepper Flakes, Garlic Powder, Hot Spanish Paprika, Old Bay, Allspice, and a touch of Montreal Steak Seasoning. And no, I didn’t measure. I tasted the marinade as I added spices than added more if it needed it. In the end, I added a bit more soy and brown sugar because there wasn’t enough liquid.

As for the meat, I used thinly sliced top round that I got from the grocery store. It was already sliced, so that was convenient. I then trimmed all the fat off the edges, then made thin strips (about an inch to an inch-and-a-half). According to my research, you should use very lean meat as fat will spoil over time. Next time, I’m going to try it with flank and flap steak.

After prepping the meat, I dumped it all into the marinade and massaged it to make sure all the slices got coated. Then I transferred the entire mix into a Ziploc bag to marinate in my fridge overnight.

The next morning, I set up a cooling rack over a large baking sheet and placed the slices on the rack. Then I popped it into my Traeger set to “Smoke” for 4 1/2 hours. I let the meat cool to room temperature, then transferred it to a couple of Ziploc bags and into the fridge. The bulk of it is going to my son as a part of a college care package this weekend when I see him. I showed him the picture I took and he replied with a “fire” emoji.

Tell you what, it may be an investment in time, but it beats the shit out of paying $15 for a bag of jerky!