So, with all the football going on in our house, pizza has become the food of choice. Now, I’m not dissing the ready made or order-in kind but there truly is NOTHING better than a homemade pizza. Trying to perfect that crust thing is a little work of love because we all have our favorite “thickness”. Mine leans to the crackery crisp sort with minimal sauce and loads of ingredients and fresh mozzarella (homemade mozarella is another blog).
There seems to be challenges as to whether the cheese will melt or brown in the same amount of time it takes to heat, or cook the rest of the pie crust and toppings. My epiphany one day was to precook the crust (so that I get the crispy crust I like) and add the ingredients a little later on. Like precooking a pie crust.
If you don’t wanna play with making your own yeast dough to punch down, Trader Joe’s has some nice packaged pizza dough in the cheese section. This is raw dough and requires refrigeration but you’ll be using them right away so not to worry.
Fresh sauce is the BEST and has way less sugar than the canned kind. Let the dough rest a bit after taking out of the refrigerator on a lightly floured surface and then roll out the dough to the desired thickness. Precook to a light golden color and then let it rest again until it’s time for serious pie making.
Put on the sauce with the back of a spoon and TA DA…you’re ready to go. Twice cooking the crust and melting the cheese fresh along with your other added ingredients (pepperoni, sausage, alici anchovies, kalamatas, fresh herbs…the list is endless) makes a perfect pie with a little charred crust on the edge. Great for sinking your teeth into - and your guests. You could have the crusts precooked and have your guests put on their own toppings without waiting for delivery.
Guess what we’re having for dinner?