I Love Pizza

Dish of The Week: Pizza

My husband simply loves pizza and I mean love to the extent that I can ask him literally any day of the week if he wants pizza and the answer will be yes. Needless to say I have had to work on my pizza making skills, and I have spent quite some time perfecting recipes to please my man.  

I like my base thin and crunchy and I simply love the pizza base that was shared on the season one of Masterchef! Plain pizza dough’s I have made in the past have sometimes had a bit of a dry texture to it, but the addition of caster sugar to the dough has added a nice sweet tang to it. 

Another great tip i learned though this recipe was to allow time for the pizza sauce to simmer, as  it makes a big difference to the taste of the sauce. I use fresh oregano when I make my pizza, as I can source it easily from the local fruit store, but dried oregano is equally good. To balance some of the acidity of the tomatoes I add a teaspoon of brown sugar as well. I like my food spicy and my friend Lee shared his little cooking tip with me, which is to use a little bit of tobasco sauce in the tomato based sauce and it tastes great, so I have since then adopted it. The recipe from MasterChef recommends using a blender to process the sauce, I sometimes do and don’t, as I quite like chunky tomato pieces on my pizza.

Choosing the topping for pizza’s varies from person to person, and you can add pretty much whatever you want. I prefer to not have too much topping on the pizza as some flavors often overpower others. If you use some of the same core ingredients you can also play around with it, and make two different pizza’s without having to buy different sets of ingredients, and that’s what I chose to do today! 

Ingredients:

Makes two pizzas

Preparation time: 1,5 hours 

Pizza Base

15g dried yeast
20g caster sugar
20g salt
250g lukewarm water
1 tbs olive oil
425g (approx 3 cups) bakers grade plain flour (I use pizza four)

Pizza sauce

400g can chopped tomatoes
Pinch dried oregano

Pinch salt & freshly ground black pepper

1 teaspoon of brown sugar

Dash of Tobasco Sauce

Topping #1 

1/3 cup freshly grated Capricosa
45g thinly sliced hot salami
4 cherry tomatoes, halved
1/2 (about 125g) buffalo mozzarella
6 large mint leaves

 

Topping #2

1/3 cup freshly grated Capricosa

Thinly sliced Capsicum

1/3 of a Yellow onion- thinly sliced

3 Mushrooms

45g thinly sliced hot salami/ pepperoni

1 slice of Soccerball Ham

1/2 of a red chilli and 1 jalapeno

1/2 (about 125g) buffalo mozzarella

 4 Cherry tomatoes, halved

How to go about making it: 

1. For the pizza base: Combine yeast, sugar, salt, water and oil in a bowl, whisk to combine. Cover and set aside for 10 minutes until bubbles start to appear on surface. Transfer to a large bowl, add the flour and bring together in the bowl with your hands. . Turn onto a lightly floured surface and knead until smooth and elastic. Place into a bowl, cover and stand in a warm place until doubles in size.

2. For the pizza sauce: Tip tomatoes into a frying pan, add oregano, salt, pepper, tobasco sauce and brown sugar, and cook for 10 minutes until sauce thickens. Set aside to cool then blend or process until smooth (optional).

3. Pizza Stone- Place pizza stone into the oven and preheat oven and stone to 250 degrees celsius fan forced for about 30 minutes. like using a pizza stone when baking my pizza’s in the oven, as it gives it the rustic Italian flair to it. 

Using a pizza stone is quite a skill as you have to be quick with adding the sauce and topping as it is literally cooking whilst you are doing these processes. Hence sometimes I find it easier to use a normal tray for the pizza, and today I opted for one with a pizza stone and one on a baking tray. We had a vote on it after  we had tried both and preferred the pizza that had been baked on the pizza stone, but again it comes down to individual preference.

4. When the base has doubled in size add it to a lightly floured work surface and kneed it a little bit, use a rolling pin, and I try to use the rolling pin clockwise to make a round shape. To allow for air to come though the pizza and to get a light and crispy touch to it stick a fork throughout the dough before applying the sauce and topping. 

5. Cooking the pizza -Knock the dough down. Using 180g (about one-quarter) dough for 1 pizza, knead on a floured surface until smooth. Roll out until 5mm thick. Place dough onto the very hot pizza stone. 

For topping option #1: Spoon over about half of the pizza sauce then sprinkle capricosa cheese. Top with salami and cherry tomatoes. Cook 6-8 minutes or until base is golden and crisp. After you have taken the pizza out of the oven add Buffalo Mozzarella cheese and mint leaves.

For topping option #2: Add all the ingredients (including the Buffalo Mozzarella cheese) to the pizza and cook for 6-8 minutes. (If you are not using a pizza stone, cook the pizza until dough looks crisp and cheese has melted). 

I like serving my pizza with a basic salad of lettuce, red onion, cucumber and cherry tomatoes, and as a true Norwegian I like sour cream with everything. So I dare you to try having a dash of sour cream with the pizza as it goes really well together with the sweet dough and spicy toppings!

Linnemoren