How to properly defrost and proof your dough balls for best results
So you’ve had the knock at the door, received your Homemade Pizza Club parcel containing your little doughy balls of magic and can’t wait to get stuck into some incredible tasting pizza!
But there’s a bit to do yet, and how you treat the dough will make a big difference as to how easy it is to use and how good the taste and texture is.
If you want to get the most from your dough balls, here’s some advice on how to defrost and proof your dough balls properly.
What is dough proofing?
Proofing dough is the process whereby the dough is left to rise, allowing the yeast to feed on sugars in the flour which produces carbon dioxide and alcohol. Over time this develops flavour and texture in the pizza. Without adequate proofing, pizza is lacking in flavour, dense, chewy and all round not as good. A properly proofed dough ball will give you the following.
🍕Complex and delicious flavour
🍕Easier to work with
🍕Light and airy texture with attractive bubbled appearance
So how do you properly proof your dough balls?
Firstly, the dough has to be defrosted, so the proofing will happen in 2 stages.
- Defrosting the dough
- Proofing the dough
By far the best way of defrosting and proofing your dough is by putting it into the refrigerator overnight. This way the dough defrosts nice and slowly and gradually reactivates the yeast, which then starts to feed on the flour, kickstarting the proofing process.
The important thing is to minimise air around the dough. In professional pizza kitchens, they use stacked plastic trays to achieve this, but they are too big for home use. We suggest placing your dough balls in one of the following.
- A sealed freezer bag, squeezing as much air out of the bag as you can before placing it in the fridge.
- A plastic Tupperware container, round if possible.
- Our plastic proofing pots, which are available to buy on our website. These are fully reusable, so you should only need to buy them once. Simply place one dough ball in each pot and seal with the supplied lid.
Once you’ve got your dough in the fridge, leave it overnight to defrost. By the morning it will have defrosted nicely and is ready to start proofing. You have 2 choices here, you can either proof it in a warmer environment out of the fridge and use it that day, or for even better results, leave it in the fridge to cold proof for another 24-48 hours.
The longer your dough proofs for, the better the results you will get from it. It will continue developing in flavour and texture the longer it is left and will pay your patience back in spades! Be careful not to allow your dough to over-proof as this can affect its performance, but a 48 hour defrost/proof should be the perfect amount of time to get you great results.
Once you’re ready to use your nicely proofed dough, simply remove it carefully from your proofing container and it’s ready to go. It’ll smell deliciously malty and have a complex and very pleasant aroma.
