The dough will be extremely soft and sticky, stringy and impossible to handle without it tearing when it’s past its prime. If the dough was in a box and it is now flat and all flowed together and has a very pockmarked appearance it’s most likely past its prime. If you have a dough that you think is past its prime and you’re in a commercial setting (like a pizzeria) it’s best to see if you might be able to salvage the dough by reforming it back into dough balls, if you can, proceed to do so but don’t use it for pizza, instead use it for bread sticks or garlic knots and make fresh dough to get you back on track as quickly as possible. If you’re in a real pinch for dough scale up a 1/2 size emergency dough and to this add 1/2 batch of the blown dough (do this ONLY if you know why the original dough blew), mix the new dough until smooth + three additional minutes, immediately scale and ball and allow to set at room temperature until the dough balls can be easily opened into skins for immediate use.Depending upon your shop temperature this dough should be good to use for about 60-minutes or a little more, after that begin opening the dough into skins that are placed onto screens and placed in a wire tree rack in the cooler (be sure to cover the rack with a plastic bag after about 30-minutes to prevent drying. These pre-opened skins will be good for the remainder of the day. To use, remove from the cooler about 20-minutes prior to use, turn off of the screen, reshape if necessary and place back onto another baking screen or prep peel for dressing. NEVER just leave the prepared dough skin on the screen for dressing and baking as there is a potential for the dough to flow into the screen openings thus locking the baked crust and the screen together. Trust me, you don’t want to go there!
Any left over emergency dough can be reincorporated into your new dough at the end of the day but do not exceed 15% of the new dough weight for the amount of emergency dough to add. Again, make bread sticks and garlic knots form as much of th eold emergency dough as possible. If you par-bake them and store in a closed dough box they will keep for several days at room temperature and all you need to do is to reheat them for serving.
Tom Lehmann/The Dough Doctor.
