Pizza dough calculator in French: the complete fermentation guide, step by step

The short answer

The calculator starts from a style (twelve, from Neapolitan TSG to Detroit, each with its hydration, thickness and fermentation windows), a number of pizzas and a three-stage schedule: bulk at room temperature, cold in the fridge, final proof before baking. From the temperature of each stage it computes the fermentation load and solves the yeast that reaches it. The result: a weigh-out in grams, flour, water, salt, oil, yeast, and an honest range on the yeast.

Three display levels keep someone who wants a pizza on Saturday from drowning in a pizza maker's settings. At the basic level, three settings and a one-tap schedule. At the intermediate level, flours, salt, oil, preferments, the detailed schedule, toppings and saving. At the advanced level, everything: sourdough, Li.Co.Li., additions, yeast equivalences, baker's percentages and the load in hour-equivalents.

Getting started in sixty seconds

1. Pick a style. If in doubt, New York for a home oven at 260 °C on steel, Neapolitan for an oven at 430 °C and above. Each style sets hydration, thickness and the target fermentation load to documented values.
2. Say how many pizzas and what diameter. The calculator works by surface, not diameter: a 16-inch has 31 % more surface than a 14-inch, and it knows.
3. Pick a schedule. Same day (about 6 h), overnight (about 24 h) or two days cold (about 48 h). Each button sets the three stages to typical kitchen and fridge temperatures.
4. Read the weigh-out. Flour, water, salt, oil in grams, yeast in grams with its range. Weigh everything, water included. A cup of water is 237 g or 250 g depending on who is talking; a scale does not argue.

That is all it takes for a first decent dough. Everything else in this article explains what you can refine, and why.

The schedule: bulk, cold, final proof, at your temperature

At the intermediate level, each stage has a duration and a temperature. Bulk is the fermentation in mass after mixing, at room temperature. Cold is the stay in the fridge, in bulk or in balls. The final proof is the return to room temperature before stretching: two hours minimum for a 250 g ball out of a fridge, otherwise it resists and tears. The three durations do not add up: their load adds up, and one hour at 24 °C is worth a dozen hours at 4 °C for the rise.

Temperatures are the part most people guess, and it is the mistake that costs the most. Measure your kitchen and your fridge once with a thermometer, and enter the real values. Most domestic fridges sit between 3 and 6 °C, and over 48 hours the difference shows. The model also accounts for the time your ball takes to cool: about two hours for 250 g, four for a 2 kg bulk.

Yeast: solved, not guessed

The calculator does not ask how much yeast you want to use. It asks when you want to bake, and it solves the dose. The displayed range (±18 %) is not a flourish: it reflects the gap between a microbial growth rate, which the model describes well, and the gas actually produced in your dough, which depends on things nobody measures at home.

The dose is given in instant dry yeast. At the advanced level the equivalences are shown: active dry, multiply by 1.25; fresh, multiply by 3. They are approximate equivalences, and written as such. If your yeast is six months old and has been sitting at the back of the pantry, it is weaker than any calculator assumes: time to test it in a glass of warm sweetened water before counting on it.

Flours: one, two, or gluten-free

At the intermediate level you pick your flour from a library that knows its strength (W), its tenacity-to-extensibility ratio (P/L), its absorption and its enzyme activity, with a confidence rating that says where each value comes from. You can blend two flours: the engine computes the W and P/L of the blend pro rata, applies a penalty when there is bran, and tells you how the blend will handle. It is the simplest way to get a "pizza" flour from what a Canadian grocery store carries: all-purpose and bread flour, in the proportion the calculator shows you.

The Gluten-free button switches engines. The dough has no gluten, so no W and no P/L: structure comes from a psyllium or xanthan gel, and the calculator weighs that gel against the water you add. Eleven published doughs, in fourteen formulations by style, are built in with their guard rails, and at the advanced level sourdough applies to gluten-free too.

Preferments and sourdough

At the intermediate level, the leavening toggle goes from direct to poolish, biga or sponge. The calculator then produces two weigh-outs: the preferment's (flour, water, yeast, time and temperature) and the final mix's, with the top-up yeast and the window in which the preferment is ripe. The advanced level adds Li.Co.Li. and natural sourdough: you enter your inoculation rate, it tells you whether it carries your schedule, suggests the rate that would, estimates the expected pH and character, and computes your feeding (1:5:5, for instance) with the peak time at your kitchen's temperature. Two articles on this site go further: the preferment comparison, and sourdough by temperature.

Toppings, additions and sauce

The toppings section computes sauce, mozzarella and hard cheese per pizza, by surface rather than diameter, at three levels (light, medium, generous). It also gives a raw sauce recipe in grams, because a cooked sauce has no place on a Neapolitan. At the advanced level, the additions section accepts any extra ingredient (semolina, malt, milk powder, flavoured oil) and recomputes the dough's real hydration when the addition contains water.

Save, share, receive by email

The Create my recipe link button builds an address that holds your entire recipe, settings and schedule included. Message it to yourself, bookmark it, or paste it to someone: on opening it, the calculator sets itself back exactly to your state. Nothing is stored on a server: the recipe is in the address itself.

You can also receive the recipe by email. Two separate boxes: the sending (required, and the address is not kept) and the newsletter (optional, unticked by default, confirmed by a click in the email, unsubscribe at any time). It complies with Quebec's Law 25, and above all it is plain respect.

The calculator below opens on a New York at the basic level. Go up one level, set the schedule to your real temperatures, and watch the yeast follow.

The mistakes that come back most often

1. Leaving the default temperatures. They are plausible, not yours. A fridge at 2 °C and a kitchen at 26 °C change the dose by half or double.
2. Reading the diameter as a ball size. Ball weight depends on the style (thickness) and the surface. Two 12-inch Neapolitans do not weigh like two 12-inch Detroits.
3. Measuring water by volume. Everything is in grams for a reason. The Volumes button exists for kitchens without a scale, and it says when a measure is unreliable (salt, above all).
4. Changing level and being surprised that settings disappear. They are still there: the basic level hides them and leaves them at their style value.
5. Keeping a quick recipe's dose for a long fermentation. That is the mistake the calculator exists to prevent. Let it solve.