South Shore Bar Pizza (SSBP) Recipe

South Shore Bar Pizza (SSBP) is one of the easiest types of pizza to make because there is very little physical handling of the dough, compared to Pizza Napoletana. It bakes perfectly in a home oven at 500f -- no special pizza oven or baking steel required.

The dough produced in this recipe holds up extremely well in the freezer. I usually make 8 dough balls at a time in my 6qt stand mixer and freeze 6 of them. I can't tell any difference between pizza made with frozen and fresh dough balls.

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Link to this sectionDough

Makes enough for 2 dough balls:

1. Activate yeast by combining and let sit for 15 minutes:
   1. 3.2g Fleischmanns Dry Yeast
   2. 1/2 cup warm (90-100f) water
2. Melt 2 tbs butter, let cool, add 1 tbs corn oil
3. In a large mixing bowl, combine dry ingredients:
   1. 250g King Arthur all-purpose flour
   2. 3/4 tsp fine sea salt
   3. 3/4 tsp fine granulated sugar
4. Mix cooled butter & corn oil into activated yeast
5. Mix the butter, oil and yeast into the large mixing bowl, and knead into dough
   1. I use a KitchenAid Pro 600 at Speed 2 for ~6 minutes
6. Cover with towel & leave at room temperature 75 minutes
7. Weigh and divide evenly into dough balls
8. Refrigerate overnight (I use individual dough proofing containers)
   1. If freezing, do so 16-24 hours of refrigeration
9. Let rest at room temp for about 2 hours before baking, to make it much easier to stretch in the pan

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Link to this sectionCheese

For each pizza -- never buy pre-shredded cheese:

• 85g (3oz) sharp cheddar
  • Tip: orange cheddar is easier to mix with white mozzarella
• 45g (1.5oz) low-moisture, whole milk mozzarella

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Link to this sectionSauce

120-130ml is "traditional" for SSBP. You can use whatever brand you like, or use my recipe for fresh, homemade pizza sauce:

• Start with a 28oz can of whole, peeled San Marzano tomatoes
  • Wegman's store brand is my go-to, as they are DOP certified and very reasonably priced
• Either hand-crush or use an immersion blender to reduce the tomatoes to 95% liquid (very few, if any chunks)
• Add & mix 1.5 tsp salt
• Add & mix fresh basil
  • If you don't have fresh basil, 1 tsp of dried basil or mixed Italian herbs is a great substitute
• (Optional) Add onion and/or garlic, either freshly-minced or granulated, to taste. If using fresh onion or garlic, it should be in addition to the 120-130ml of tomato sauce.

Homemade pizza sauce should not be pre-cooked because it will be baked in a thin layer at high temps. I usually make this sauce and take what I need for pizza, then turn what's leftover into a fresh salsa or pasta sauce.

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Link to this sectionBaking

1. Coat bottom and sides of pan with 1 tbs melted butter before laying dough
2. Flatten the dough into the pan so it meets the sides, but doesn't ride up them
   • It can help to pre-flatten the dough with a rolling pin before placing in the buttered pan
3. Perforate the dough with a fork to allow air bubbles to escape... I usually spend 30-60 seconds doing this for each pan to make a ton of little holes.
4. Add sauce, cheese & toppings
5. Bake in pre-heated oven at 500f for about 15 minutes on the bottom shelf
   • IMPORTANT: Visually monitor the baking after the ~10 minute mark when making this recipe for the first couple times, because the exact bake time may vary by several minutes depending on your oven and how crispy you prefer your pizza.

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Link to this sectionA note about pans...

The original SSBP pan was created by Bay State Restaurant Products in Brockton, MA. Those pans are the best for this style of pizza, and they are cheaper than similar pans from bigger-brand competitors. Check out this article about BSRP on bostonglobe.com.

I am not aware of any way to buy these pans online, though. You'll need to call the shop and place a mail order over the telephone, which I still recommend doing if you can't make the trek to their lovely storefront.

If you want to buy pans online and don't mind a slightly lesser quality for a slightly higher price, the best you can get is the 10" Straight Side Pan from LloydPans. I started with the Lloyd pan and used it for years before eventually getting a BSRP pan, and found the BSRP to be much less prone to sticking and generally easier to work with.