All in the Dough

One thing you must not do is kill the yeast.
It is a very sad occurence, when you do. It falls to the bottom of the water and looks limp and lifeless. The water looks dirty with specks of bottom dwellers.
Sadly, this happened to me Saturday, when I was making pizza dough. I heated the water for 2:30 minutes. Major mistake. 60 seconds is problably enough. I didn't take the temperature, just add the packet of yeast. About five minutes later, I see that the yeast is at the bottom. Whom did I call? My father. He said that I need to make sure the temperature was less than 120 degrees. So I drove to the grocery store and bought another packet of yeast.
The next batch I tested the water with my candy thermometer. The yeast bloomed. It grew. It foamed.
The pizza came out crusty on the outside and soft on the inside. From now on I check the water before adding the yeast. I can't have too many deaths on my conscience.