You Wanna Pizza Me?
Turn your oven on!
(425F and put your stone in, if you have one)
I haven't made pizza in years. Probably since Lee's was open.
What better way to get back into the thick of things, than by trying it out at home.
It's a simple way to utilize fresh ingredients, it's fairly cheap, and if you set yourself up ahead of time, it's pretty fast too!
Ingredients:
- Pizza Dough
- Corn meal (sparingly, so your dough doesn't stick when you transfer it)
- Flour
- Marinara sauce
- Toppings (we chose): cheddar/mozzarella cheese, pepperoni, onions, peppers, prosciutto, anchovies, arugula, basil.
Now that you've got your ingredients sprawled out everywhere, you know you're ready to begin.
Turn on some jams!
Make sure you take your dough out of the plastic and set it in a bowl so that it can rise, and warm up a little. This prevents your stone from cracking (due to hot/cold temperatures)
This is the point where you want to start prepping all the ingredients. Chopping, peeling, opening, slicing. Your stone should be in the oven - if you haven't turned it on already, what are you waiting for?!. And if you don't have a stone, that's totally fine, just put a baking sheet in the oven.
You want to make sure your oven is nice and hot, so make sure it's been on for at least forty-five minutes (after it's done preheating)
Once that's done. You're ready to assemble.
Grab a bit of corn meal and some flour and put it on a flat surface (if you don't have a board you use another baking sheet or some aluminum foil on top of a flat surface). Mix it around and spread it across the whole surface, so your dough doesn't stick.
nothing fancy, and clearly not perfect.
Put as much or as little sauce on as you'd like, and whatever toppings you prefer.
Here comes the tricky part. You want to slice your pizza as close as you can to the edge of the board so that you can place it on the hot stone.
If you don't have a stone, now is when you should put some olive oil on the sheet in the oven (so it doesn't stick!).
Depending on how crispy you like your crust, and how thick you've made it, you should keep an eye on it - it should take around 15-20 minutes.
Don't be afraid to check on it!
Voila!
Clearly I didn't think pizza was enough, so I made pasta as well.
Sue me.