Pillar · Pizza Flour
Pizza Flour for Home Bakers: A Friendly Field Guide
Walk into a professional pizzeria in Italy and you will see one kind of flour on the shelf. Walk into an American supermarket and you will see fifteen, none of which were designed for the pizza you are trying to make.
We believe the home baker deserves the same flour the pizzaioli of Naples reach for. The trick is knowing which one to grab.
The home baker's problem
Most American all-purpose flours sit at around 10–11% protein with no published W-value, no ash content, no information about gluten quality. They are designed to be okay at everything. Pizza dough is not a thing where okay is acceptable. You want a dough that stretches like a sheet without tearing, holds its shape in the oven, and develops the brown leopard-spotting that signals a properly cooked crust.
That requires a flour designed specifically for pizza. Not bread flour. Not all-purpose. Pizza flour.
The three flours every home pizza baker should own
1. Pizza Napoletana (W260)
This is the workhorse. AVPN-certified, made for 12 to 24-hour ferments at refrigerator temperature, hydration range 60–65%. If you are making pizza this weekend and you mixed your dough this morning, this is the flour. It is also forgiving, which matters when you are stretching dough on a Tuesday after work and the kids are asking when dinner is ready.
2. Manitoba (W390)
The marathoner. High protein, very high W-strength, designed for ferments of 48 to 72 hours or for blending with weaker flours to give them more backbone. Use this when you want to plan a Saturday pizza on Wednesday night. Or blend it 50/50 with a weaker flour to extend its life.
3. Non Solo Grano (Whole grain blend)
The character actor. Adds nutty depth and visible specks to the crust. Use it as a 20–30% blend with Pizza Napoletana when you want to put a little soul into a classic dough.
Pizza flour is not a flavor preference. It is a tool.
Five rules that will save you
- Weigh your flour. Cups are a lie.
- Hydrate to your skill level. Start at 60% if you are new, work up to 65–70% as your hands learn the dough.
- Salt is 2.5–3% of flour weight. Less and your dough is flat. More and it dries out.
- Use less yeast than you think. 0.1–0.3% of flour weight is plenty for a long ferment.
- Trust the cold. Refrigerator ferments are not a shortcut. They are the destination.
What we believe about the home baker
There is a quiet snobbery in some of the artisan baking world that says professional flours are wasted on home kitchens. We disagree. We believe the home baker is the future of food culture. We believe a 12-year-old kid who learns to stretch a Neapolitan dough at her kitchen counter is going to grow up caring about where her food comes from. That is worth a 2.2 lb bag of Italian flour.
Start with Pizza Napoletana. Make pizza this Saturday. Tell us how it goes.