Pizza Night

Friday night I was hungry for pizza and after reading an article in Saveur I thought I would try making one from scratch. I checked the fridge and I had most of the ingredients for the toppings but I would need some items for the crust and sauce. So I made the grocery list and headed to Cub for the remaining items.

For the crust I followed the Saveur recipe but I just made a smaller amount I only wanted dough for two 12 inch pizzas.

1 Tbsp. Olive oil
1 tsp. Kosher salt
1 cup 115ºF water
3 cups Gold Medal flour
½ Tbsp. Sugar
½ Tbsp. Quick rise active dry yeast
First I combined the olive oil, yeast, sugar, salt, and water and let it sit for about 15 minutes until the mixture had a good foam on it. Then I stirred in the flour and kneaded it for a few minutes until smooth. I cut the dough ball in half and placed on a floured baking sheet, covered in plastic wrap and let it rise above the warmed oven. I let it rise for about 90 minutes until the dough had doubled in size.

Now for the sauce. I liked the idea of a homemade sauce and the one in March 2010 issue looked good.

1 14.5 ounce can peeled tomatoes
2 minced garlic cloves
½ grated onion
1 Tbsp. Olive oil
1 Tbsp. Chopped fresh basil
1 tsp. dried oregano
Salt and pepper to taste
To make the sauce I placed the ingredients into a food processor and pureed to a nice smooth sauce. This made a nice bright red, flavorful sauce, but yet it was still light.

To make the pizza I shaped the dough on a floured counter top and tossed until it was thin. I placed the crust on parchment paper to make for ease of oven removal. I chose to top the first pizza with mozzarella and parmesan cheese, pepperoni, salami, onions, mushrooms and fresh basil. The second pizza I topped with mozzarella and parmesan cheese, anchovies, onions, mushrooms, black olives and fresh basil. I discovered that our oven went up to 550º F, so it only took about 7 minutes to cook to a nice golden brown crust.

Both pizzas ended up great. The crust was crispy on the outside and soft in the inside. One change for the next time would be a little less sugar as the crust was maybe just a hair too sweet. This actually was pretty easy and I will definitely make again.