Simple Pizza, Fatayer and Manakesh Dough

The first recipe I shared on this blog was my mother's dough recipe back in 2017. In my opinion, my mom's dough recipe is perfect, we all love it, anyone who tried here fatayer loves her dough.

Here's why I think it's perfect:

- if you stretch the dough, it's gives a nice thin crust.

- if you give it thickness in the pan, it's a nice fluffy bread like crust.

- it works perfect when we make it in the brick oven.

- it gives a golden brown color and it's crispy at the bottom when baked in a home oven.

- it's similar to pizzeria dough recipes.

- it's great for pizza, fatayer in all kinds, and breakfast manakesh.

- My mom has been using it for years, and doesn't plan on changing it. Thank God!

But my mom doesn't have measurements for her dough recipe, which means I don't really know what goes into it. So in 2017, I asked her to make it in front of me with measuring utensils to get some estimates for the dough which I shared. But for the past 3 years I have been using that recipe, and it did not come out the same. I had so many fails, and from those fails I LEARNED A LOT!!

Recently I went into research mode because I was determined to get it right. I wanted to know what each ingredient did to the dough, why it's used, and I needed a perfect ratio. I relied mostly on Tom Lehmann "The Dough Doctor" interviews and articles to understand how to form this dough so I can get it perfectly each time.

Here's what I found:

YEAST

Yeast is a leavening agent that makes bread and dough rise. Just like baking soda and baking powder in cakes.

Yeast is an active single-cell organism that needs warmth and food (sugar) to thrive and form carbon dioxide which helps dough rise.

There are a few types of yeast, but for our homes we mostly have Instant Dry Yeast. Once you purchase yeast and open it, place it in an airtight container in the fridge or freezer. When you need to use it, take the amount you need and return it back immediately.

Yeast must be hydrated with lukewarm water first to work.

SUGAR

Sugar is not only there to give the dough taste. It's job is to also provide nutrients to the yeast to help it rise. Sugar also helps in the development of crust color. In this recipe I use granulated sugar. But in other dough recipe there are other sweetening ingredients used, such as: molasses, brown sugar, honey, milk lactose, etc.

WATER

Water combines all the dry ingredients together with the small amount of oil in the recipe. Water also hydrates the yeast to help activate it. It's important to start with lukewarm water in this recipe for it to work.

Lukewarm water (when measured with a cooking thermometer) is between 98-105 Fahrenheit. But if you want to feel it, but your finger in the water. If you feel it's hotter than your body temperature and you move you hand back quickly, it's not ready yet. It should also not be too cold that you can just drink it from the bowl. Another tip is that lukewarm water doesn't have any heat clouds coming from it.

SALT

Salt is another contributor to taste in dough. But opposite to sugar, it helps reduce the speed in which yeast is rising, called "over fermented dough" or "blown-up."

Salt also helps improve the handling properties of the dough giving it a drier feel and reduces the stickiness.

OILS

In this dough recipe I use olive oil and canola oil/ vegetable oil. The job of the oils in dough is to provide some fat content to help the dough bake. Oils also give the dough tenderness and stretch-ability with forming. Oils will also help to stop moisture from developing on the top of dough during baking when you add toppings to it

FLOUR

In this dough recipe, I use all-purpose flour. We prefer to use King Arthur all-purpose flour because it has a high protein content of 11.8% that just works wonderfully with all baked goods.

Flour gives dough the structure it needs to be dough. It is the framework that houses all the leavening agent and ingredients that work together to make dough.

Based in this research I developed this recipe following the ingredients that my mom uses in her dough and a method that will work for a beginner cook like me.

Recipe:

makes two 14 inch round pizza dough

2 cups water, lukewarm

1 teaspoon granulated sugar

1 tablespoon Instant Dry Yeast

3/4 teaspoon Salt

1 tablespoon Olive Oil (plus 1 tsp for later)

1 tablespoon Canola Oil

4 + 1/4 cups all-purpose flour

When rolling and baking:

3 tablespoon canola oil

1/4 cup all-purpose flour

Directions:

1. Warm water to 100 Fahrenheit on a kettle or until you touch the water and it feels warm. It's very important it's not hot so it doesn't kill the yeast. Pour the water into a bowl.

2. Sprinkle sugar over the water and give it a stir to dissolve the sugar. Then sprinkle yeast (don't mix) let it sit for 5-15 min based on how it activates. You are looking for it to become cloudy on top.

3. Then add salt and oils, mix with a whisk.

4. Add flour 1/2 cup at a time. Start he first 2 cups of flour by mixing with a whisk. Once the mixture starts to become drier, use your hand. Add all 4 cups of flour slowly. Then add the 1/4 cup of flour is the dough is still very sticky.

Note: The dough will still be sticky and wet because you just kneaded it with your hand so do not continue to add flour past the 4+1/4 cup. It will have too much gluten and will be very dry when baked if you continue to add more.

5. Shape it into a ball in the bowl. It might be slightly sticky, that's fine.

6. Drizzle 1 tsp of olive oil on the surface of the dough and spread with your hand.

Note: adding olive oil on the surface will help it from drying and will make removing it from the bowl easier.

7. Cover the bowl tightly with a plastic wrap, and wrap the bowl with a blanket.

8. Let it rise for 1 hr. in a dark warm place.

Pre-heat oven to 450 Fahrenheit

9. When the dough has risen, flour your surface. Then divide the dough in half. Stretch with your hand first and shape into a circle then lightly roll with a floured rolling pin, keep stretching and rolling until you get the diameter you want.

Note: limit flouring the surface with 1/4 cup of flour. Any flour on the surface is also being incorporated into the dough

10. Spray a non-stick pizza pan with canola oil or drizzle and spread with a brush. Place dough on the pan. Top with your desired toppings. Then brush the top side crust with cooking oil.

11. Bake at 450 Fahrenheit . Until the bottom of the crust is golden brown (lift with a fork to check) then broil low to brown top.