I love slow fermented bases and breads. Seriously! The flavor intensifies with time. Every bite is such a burst of flavors, I cannot get enough of it. One of the best recipes I have found for a pizza base takes time and patience and is worth every minute of the wait. Enter 72 hour pizza dough! I think Jim Lahey made this recipe famous and this is more or less an adaptation of the same.

Ingredients (Yields 2 personal sized pizza bases)

• 250g of all purpose flour
• 1/8th tsp of yeast
• 8g of sea salt
• 175-180g of water

Recipe

• In a bowl, add the flour. To this add the salt to a side and yeast to another. Make sure that the salt and yeast do not interact directly right away. Salt inhibits yeast activity.
• Now add in the water and mix it all way. Does not require much kneading. The dough may seem dry first, then way too shaggy, don’t worry. It comes together beautifully in about 3-5 minutes of mixing it thoroughly.
• Cover the bowl and leave it to rise for about 12-18 hours (depending on the temperature of the place you are at). It needs to more than double in size
• Once it has, turn the dough over on to floured surface and divide into two.
• Each dough ball, flour your fingers lightly and bring the left corner into the middle, followed by right into the middle, then top corner to middle followed by bottom corner. It would look like an envelope at this stage.
• Now flip the dough ball over and try to pull it to yourself, ensuring that it is forming into a tighter ball with each pull. Do this about 5-6 times or until the dough ball seems tight.
• Now transfer each dough ball into a well oiled bowl and cover it and pop it in the fridge. It will continue to rise for the second time, slowly developing flavors.
• When you intend to make the pizza, take it out of the fridge and leave it on the counter for a couple of hours. The place I live in requires that I leave them out for 5-6 hours, so take note of ambient temperatures.
• Once the dough balls are at room temperature and rising again, form a pizza base, sauce it up, add your favorite toppings and bake at 500F for about 8-12 minutes. Et voila! Pizza ready!

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