🔍 Read the full analysis: Pizza Dough, Neapolitan Style: 24-Hour Fermentation Made Simple on Mad Tasting

Prime Big Deal Days · Oct 6–7Offer from Amazon

Get kitchen gear delivered free — and shop member deals

• Fast, free delivery on millions of items
• Access to Prime Big Deal Days deals on October 6–7
• Prime Video, Amazon Music and more included

Start your free Prime trial →Free trial for eligible customers · Cancel anytime

As an affiliate, we earn on qualifying purchases.Hide

Mad Tasting has published a 24-hour home pizza dough guide that uses four ingredients to make four Neapolitan-style pizzas. The recipe calls for 500 grams of flour, 315 grams of water, 14 grams of salt and 1 gram of instant yeast, with an overnight refrigerator rest followed by about three hours at room temperature before baking.

The formula makes four dough balls weighing about 250 grams each. Mad Tasting gives the water as 63% of the flour weight, salt as 2.8% and instant yeast as 0.2%. It recommends measuring by weight, since a small difference in yeast can affect a long fermentation. The guide lists “00” flour or bread flour as options and says all-purpose flour can also work, although the dough may stretch and brown differently.

The sample schedule starts at about 6 p.m. on the first day: mix the ingredients, knead until smoother, then let the dough rest for 30 to 60 minutes. Divide it into four balls, cover them in a container with room to expand and refrigerate overnight. At about 3 p.m. the next day, take the dough out; around 6 p.m., check its condition, shape and bake. The total is roughly 23 to 24 hours, depending on the actual start and finish times.

Mad Tasting says the schedule is a guide rather than a fixed test. The dough should look fuller and feel airy and relaxed while retaining a rounded shape. Keep it covered to prevent the surface from drying. For shaping, press the center outward while preserving gas around the rim, then bake on a thoroughly heated pizza steel or stone. A standard home oven will not match the intense heat or short baking time of a wood-fired oven.

A Manageable Schedule for Home Pizza

The recipe gives home cooks a planned overnight fermentation that requires little hands-on attention during the resting period. Refrigeration slows fermentation, making the timing easier to manage, but it does not stop the dough from changing. The guide therefore pairs its hours with observable cues such as expansion, airiness and whether the dough still holds its shape.

Those cues matter because kitchen temperature and measurement can shift the result. Mad Tasting advises using cooler water in a warm kitchen and allowing more time in a chilly room. Too much yeast or excess warmth can make dough advance quickly and become slack, according to the guide. The practical payoff is a method readers can adjust without treating the clock as a guarantee.

What Makes This Neapolitan Style

The recipe follows a lean dough formula of flour, water, salt and yeast, without oil or sugar. Mad Tasting describes the method as Neapolitan-style and connects the dough’s raised rim, known in Naples as the cornicione, to fermentation and gentle shaping that preserves gas near the edge.

The article frames the recipe as an adaptation for home equipment, not a claim that the pizza meets traditional certification standards. It notes that “00” refers to how finely flour is milled, not by itself to the flour’s protein strength. Bread flour may absorb water differently, so the guide suggests holding back a little water at first and adding it if the dough feels stiff.

Timing Depends on Dough Conditions

The guide does not give one guaranteed rise time for every kitchen. Room temperature, flour choice and yeast measurement can affect fermentation, and the source provides no controlled comparison of the finished pizzas. It presents the recipe as a starting point and says to judge readiness by the dough’s expansion and feel as well as elapsed time.

It is also unclear from the recipe how closely a home-oven result will resemble pizza baked in a traditional high-heat oven. Mad Tasting says domestic ovens cannot reproduce a wood-fired oven’s intense heat and quick bake; results will depend on the oven and the steel or stone used.

Check the Dough Before Baking

After the roughly three-hour room-temperature rest on the second day, check whether each ball looks fuller, feels airy and remains rounded. If it is still firm, the guide’s schedule indicates that the dough may need more time; if it has spread and become slack, it may have fermented too far. Shape gently to preserve air at the rim, and bake on a thoroughly preheated steel or stone.

The recipe offers no additional reported development or follow-up. For readers using it, the next step is to adapt the timing to their kitchen and oven, noting room temperature and how the dough changes from mixing through baking.

Key Questions

How much dough does the recipe make?

It makes four dough balls of about 250 grams each, enough for four pizzas.

How long does the dough ferment?

The example runs for roughly 23 to 24 hours, from mixing one evening to baking the next. The guide says actual readiness depends on the dough’s expansion and feel.

Can I use all-purpose flour?

Mad Tasting says all-purpose flour can work, though the finished dough may stretch and brown differently from dough made with “00” or bread flour.

Does this recipe make officially certified Neapolitan pizza?

The source describes it as Neapolitan-style for a home kitchen; it does not claim that the recipe meets traditional certification standards.

Source: Mad Tasting

×FALL

Fall Picks

fall essentials

fall essentials

View Latest Price

As an affiliate, we earn on qualifying purchases.