Pizza pizza pizza

Oh, did we learn pizza. The teacher, Gerri Sarnataro, really knows her stuff. She first talked about the ingredients for the base... double zero flour, yeast, honey, warm water, kosher salt. Then the timing ... you need to start 24 hours ahead of when you plan to make the pizza, it needs time to ferment and relax. Then, after taking the dough out of the fridge it needs two hours to do some more relaxing. The dough was surprisingly sticky and fussy. I went into the class thinking I was going to throw the dough around.
We made pizza dough with 1/10 ounce of cake yeast in 9 ounces of warm (baby bath temperature) water, 1/10 ounce of honey, 14-16 ounces of double zero flour, 1/4 ounce of salt and 1/4 ounce of olive oil. This gets rested.

The teacher, and assistants, had made the dough ahead, so we cut off (NO stretching!) 9 to 11 ounces of pre fermented and rested dough. Then technique came into play ... we had to make a round ball, with tightly stretched skin. This rested in a warm, draft free place for and hour ... as we prepped the toppings.
The placement of the pizza on the peel was important ... right up to the front edge. The forming of the pizza crust was important, the cutting of the ingredients was important ... all worth it.
I have put up the rest of the pictures from the pizza class here
Chef Gerri has a cooking vacation spot in Umbria, Italy. Check it out.

Gerri Sarnataro

Teaching the Pizza in Rome course March 5th night

Comments on Gerri Sarnataro:
(from seriouseats )

Beginners thrive in a classroom with Gerri, as she demonstrates and then individually assists if necessary (she actually took my hands in hers to knead the dough so I could get the feel of it). 

ratemyteacher had these comments about GS:

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  Amazing and inspiring!
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  She is a wonderful chef! Ultra helpful! I wish she could be my chef for all 4 mods!!! She is just a wonderful person!
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  gerri is a wonderful chef and teacher. she is extremely intelligent, patient and a enthusiastic. although i enjoyed cooking before taking her classes, she has truly inspired me to go above and beyond.
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  she is the best, well educated, deals with students very effectively, good person, knows her breads, good teacher

Looks like a great teacher for pizza and whatever. I am looking forward to this, even though it ends at 11pm and we have to clean (mop, wash dishes, etc) after cooking.

Learning on Line

Yes, you can learn about cooking in the wild web world.

Try some Jacques Pepin videos.

I made the chicken and dessert with one, learning not only about the recipe, but learning from Jacques Pepin's comments as he prepared the dish. I also have watched :

I confess to watching this video several times before I tried pizza. A great person-to-person instructional, that was free. It enabled me to do a decent pizza.

I took a look at this: Learn to Cook Online

Whether you're a serious home cook or a culinary school hopeful looking to sharpen your cooking skills at home, our 10 week online cooking class will put you on the right path. Written by professional chefs, each lesson features up-to-date culinary tips and advice, not to mention tasty recipes. Topics include basic cooking techniques, seafood, meat and vegetable preparation, wine, and more.

Sounds interesting. Another on-line happening is the Free Culinary School I will report on both of those places soon.