Pizza
A simple, homemade pizza - all made from scratch.
Please chose good ingredients (e.g. don't use cheap cheese) and you will have a pizza that is so much better than anything you can buy frozen.
One of these 11 inch pizzas comes in at under 2 pounds ... (that's the funny currency we use over here ...)
Ingredients for the base (for 3 11 inch pizzas)
- 500g flour (plain flour, we are using yeast here!)
- 4 tablespoons olive oil
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 300 ml lukewarm water
- 2 teaspoons dried yeast
- 1/2 teaspoon sugar
Ingredients for the piazzaiola (the tomato stuff to cover the base)
- one onion
- 3 tablespoons olive oil
- 1/2 clove of garlic
- 1 400g tin of chopped tomatoes
- 1 teaspoon oregano
- a couple of leafs of fresh basil
- 1/4 teaspoon of salt
- a pinch of freshly ground pepper
Toppings (per pizza) (use any cheese and topping you like, this is just an example)
- one mozarella cheese (also nice: reggiano parmesan and medium cheddar)
- 2 slices of parma ham
- 2 slices of salami
Oven, pre-heating, temperature, ...
The type of oven you will be using has a huge influence on the outcome of your
pizza. The best oven you can use is the old electrical type oven where you can
set the heat to only come from underneath - that is ideal for pizza. Gas and
fan assisted electrical ovens aren't very good - you might end up with a soggy
pizza with burned cheese on top.
Oven temperature should be full blast - whatever oven you have. Make sure to pre-heat for quite a bit that you really have the maximum temperature that your oven get attain.
I have a lovely Smeg cooker with two ovens - one fan assisted and the other one a "traditional" electric oven which I can set to only heat the underside of the oven which works great for pizza.
Alternatively, you can use something like a Cobb Barbecue which also works well as all the heat comes from underneath.
Preparation
| The Base | |
 | Put the flour into a bowl |
 | Mix the yeast with the sugar and 50ml of the lukewarm water and stir, let sit for 10 minutes until it develops a nice foam on top |
 | Add the olive oil and salt to the flour |
 | This is what the yeast will look like after 10 minutes. Now add the yeast to the flour, oil and salt and add the rest of the lukewarm water (250 ml). Mix with your hands and knead until you have a smooth dough ... |
 | ... which should look like this! If you have any left-over dough, you can easily freeze it - I always make a bit more and keep the rest in the freezer for a quick supper. |
 | Cover the dough with a clean, dry dish towel and let it sit for an hour. |
 | In the meantime, prepare a simple pizzaiola - chop the onion and the garlic, fry in the olive oil, add the tomatoes and the spices. Let simmer for half an hour to reduce the moisture, take a blender to it and then let it cool down. |
 | This is what the dough will look like after it has risen. Now is the time to preheat your oven to full blast. |
 | Take 1/3 of the dough ... |
 | ... and spread it out into the pizza pan with your fingers. Let it sit for 10 to 15 minutes so it can rise again. If you want a very thin and crisp base, roll out the dough with a rolling pin instead of spreading it with your fingers. |
 | Chop the mozarella. |
 | Chop up your toppings - I'm using ham and salami here. |
 | Spread the piazzaiola - best done by putting it into the middle and then moving the pan quickly back and forth. |
 | Put on your toppings ... Don't overdo it on the topping side - stick with 2 or 3 toppings and don't put on too much. An overloaded pizza isn't any good. |
 | ... and then put on the cheese. Put into the pre-heated oven for approx. 20 minutes. If you find that your cheese starts to burn before the pizza base is done, put the pizza into the oven without the cheese for 5 minutes and then add the cheese - this is a hint I got from on Dianne Wilson - thanks Dianne! |
 | 20 minutes later - and look at that ... |
| Pizza made on a Cobb Barbecue | |
 | Here is quite a different pizza - no pizzaiola, and lots of different vegetables with a cheddar cheese topping. Just to prove the point, we will bake this one on a Cobb barbecue ... |
 | This is the result after 15 minutes under the closed lid - an incredibly crispy pizza - made on a barbecue! No idea if this will work on any other kind of barbecue but a Cobb - let me know if you succeed on another one. |
Best with ...
A salad and a glass of red wine.