Sicilian in a Skillet

January 20th, 2010

Forget Health Care Reform; This is Important

I’m making Sicilian pizza in my old Lodge skillet. This skillet is 12″ across, on the inside, at the bottom. I sanded it when I bought it, so the bottom isn’t as rough as most Lodge skillets.

I’m using two cups of bread flour, salt, pepper, yeast, and water. That’s it.

I let the dough rise in an oiled bowl. It stuck to the bowl, which is normal unless you add flour to the oil. It turns out this doesn’t matter, as long as you can get the dough out without mangling it. The imperfections you get from pulling the dough off the bowl disappear later.

Here is what I have right now. I oiled the dough (extra light olive oil), spread it out, flipped it (so the finger indentations would be in the bottom of the crust) and put it on top of a Pyrex bowl, which you can’t see here. The bowl is to keep the skillet off the warm stovetop. I want the warmth, but I don’t want so much of it the dough is adversely affected. As soon as the dough pumps back up, I’ll add sauce and cheese.

Ordinarily, for a 12″ pie, I use 2 ounces of sauce concentrate, plus water and other ingredients. I generally end up discarding a small amount of the sauce mix, because 2 ounces are a little too much. Today I plan to use a minimum of the whole two ounces. Sicilian requires more sauce, and it seems like Saporito (the sauce I’m using today) doesn’t extend quite as far as Super Dolce (my usual sauce). I’m pretty sure the Stanislaus website says it should be the other way around, but I call ’em as I see ’em. I’ll also use a full 8 ounces of Costco mozzarella.

The oven is at 550°. I plan to rest the skillet on the hot stone. I hope this crude Lodge skillet isn’t so thick it doesn’t heat up in time to brown the crust.

I hope I can get this silly thing out of the skillet. As of now, it’s loose, riding on a layer of oil.

More

Here’s what I have now. I put 9 ounces of cheese on it, and a little over 2 ounces of sauce (measured before adding water). Looks pretty good. I wanted to flop it out of the pan and put it on the stone during the last two minutes, but I won’t be able to. The pan is too deep. The cheese would slide around and cause problems.

More

Got a few more photos.

Here is the pie after I miraculously popped it out of the skillet. It didn’t stick at all, except for a tiny area where some cheese hit the iron. I stuck it on the stone for a minute after I got it out, to improve the crust.

Here are some slices, so you can get an idea of the thickness.

Here is the bottom of a slice. Oddly, no other slice got that dark. I should have photographed one of the others. This slice tasted off because of the burned area, but you can see the indentations in the crust, which are very important to a good Sicilian pizza.

Here is my assessment. Cast iron is not nearly as good as thin steel. The texture of the pie I made the other day was astonishing. This one was imperfect. It leaned toward leathery. The difference was small, but it’s the difference between good and sublime.

Another problem, as mentioned above: it browned unevenly. And the cast iron seemed to give it a flavor that is not right for pizza.

Last thing: to get the crust brown, I had to leave the pie in the oven until the cheese browned. Unacceptable. Burnt pizza cheese is an abomination bad pizzerias have taught Americans to like. Pizza cheese can have a small amount of browning, but this pie was at the limit.

I consider the cast iron experiment a failure. From now on, it’s thin steel or nothing. I can’t get pizza this good anywhere near me, but the other Sicilian I made was straight from paradise.

My online source for the correct pans is an outfit called Zesco. They’re expensive ($24.50 each), but they should last a hundred years. I’ll report when I get to try them out.

Incidentally, the cheap GFS pan I bought has no faults. If they made a smaller one, I would not have shelled out for rolled steel pans. If you can find a thin steel pan in a size you like, don’t bother with “authentic” pans. And bake the seasoning onto the pan, and never wash it.

3 Responses to “Sicilian in a Skillet”

  1. Heather P. Says:

    Sent you a prayer request email. Bad news at the high-risk OB.

  2. TC Says:

    Did you try pre-baking the crust for about 5 minutes before adding the sauce and cheese? I’ve done that with deep dish pizzas that I’ve made in cast iron skillets. Good results.

  3. Steve H. Says:

    There’s really no point, when a cheap steel pan gives perfect results without all that work.