Homemade Pizza Adventure #1

So as previously discussed on my blog here. I love pizza a lot. I've been on the quest to find a super thin crust pizza. Back in my hometown they are famous for cracker thin crispy pizza crusts ( think Domino's thin crust but with flavor). I've been reading blogs and searching on the web for crispy pizza crust recipes. I finally found one and I am really happy with the results. The pizza I made last night wasn't as thin and I wanted but that could be my lack of ability to read directions or that I can't spin pizza on my hands like the pros do but it was crispy, sweet, salty, and delish.



This is what our finished product looked like. Since I couldn't throw it to make it thin. I took out a giant glass bowl dusted it with flour and placed my dough over it and stretched it out to as thin as possible.

The Recipe and the blog I read to find the recipe. Kathleen's been inspiring me to try cooking outside my comfort zone. Her homemade ravioli's look ahhhmazing! I've been reading her blog for a long time and finally got in touch with her to find out about the pizza. Pretty nice little information highway this blogging thing creates!

Another few tips! I did buy a misto and a pizza peel. I did already have a pizza stone and I cooked my pizza at 550 ( the hottest my oven would go!) Now I feel super professional when I make my pizzas! Just a word of caution. This recipe needs at least 1 day to ferment so you gotta plan ahead but one batch makes 6 individual servings ( the pizza in the pic is of one crust so enough for 2 people if you have a nice little salad/veggie dish with it).

let me know if you have any tips/ideas for me on pizza

cheers-

raech

P.S. Don't forget to sign up for our craft valentine swap - deet here

Tuesday Night Ritual

I'm a big fan of pizza. Something about it to me is like the perfect combination of stuff. Bread, cheese and some form of tomato. Narm. Usually on Tuesday evenings we have pizza and watch Biggest Loser ( the irony is killing me). Normally the pizza consists of evoo, fresh mozzarella, fresh tomato and a sprinkling of fresh basil and salt as soon as its hot out of the oven. Last night the earth must have shifted because I had a taste for a greek pizza ( probably inspired by the nummy looking one our friends got on Sunday). So we tried to re-create it and it tasted pretty darn yummy.


So we snagged a boboli crust at the store because I'm too freaking lazy to make my own and we like a crispier crust rather than a super doughy one. Also, we steamed up some veggies to make it a little bit healthier. Though I'd rather just have pizza. Yeah that's right I'm a semi vegetarian who doesn't like vegetables ( maybe I'm just bored with them!)

Raechel and Jack's Greek Pizza

1 Pizza Crust ( a sweeter whole wheat crust is awesome!)
1 Tomato
1 small container of feta, green and black olives preferably soaked in evoo with Mediterranean spices (We picked ours up from the olive bar at the grocery store . This is what gives the pizza the flavor. A good sub would be flavored feta and olives that are in flavored oil or you could try to concoct your own type of herbs to put on the pizza)

Prepare your crust ( if you made your own-cook it / if you're using a premade - take it out of the bag). Strain the evoo from the olives onto the pizza and spread around the crust. Crumble the feta generously around the pizza and then chop/crumble the olives. Top with sliced tomato and cook pizza on a **stone at 425-450 for about 10 mins.

** now I realize that not everyone has a pizza stone but if you make your own pizza even 1x a week then buy a freaking stone! They're like $10-20 depending on what model you get ( ours came with a lazy susan and a pizza cutter) at Bed Bath and Beyond. Its totally worth it and makes your crust that much better on a pizza.

Potato, Asiago, and Rosemary Pizza

Ok write down these lists of ingredients and go make this pizza ASAP! I was so hungry after getting out of Salsa class. It was later in the evening and the store would be closing in a while and I just settled that a homemade pizza would rock my world. To my surprise the heavens opened up and I was born with an idea-Potato, Asiago Rosemary Pizza. To further inspire my idea when I went to the cheese section they had put out a new cheese, Rosemary encrusted Romao. Is this a sign or what? So we gathered up our last ingredients and headed home.

This is loosely the recipe that i followed. Its pretty hard to mess up a homeade pizza, especially when you are using a pre-made crust..ahem. Its quick! Don't judge me :)

Pizza Crust ( I used whole foods pre-made)
1 small Yukon gold potato ( extremely thin sliced)
1 hunk of rosemary crusted romao for shredding
Asiago/Parmesan shredded cheese
2 large garlic cloves
Crushed Rosemary (or fresh if you have on hand)

Brush your pizza crust with olive oil and I used a micro plane to grate my garlic cloves on top of the pizza ( so they were like a paste) and used a knife to spread it into the olive oil.

Top the pizza with extremely thinly sliced potato slices ( they will cook quicker). Shred the Rosemary encrusted romao over the potato slices and I mixed in the asiago/ parm so it wouldn't be sooo powerful. Dash with a little bit more rosemary if you so choose.

Bake at 400 ( or wahtever your pizza crust recipe recommends) and finish off with some salt and ground pepper.

Kids this has to be my new favorite pizza. It would go great with a nice cold crisp wine. We had pizza and a bowl of watermelon last night. It was the bees knees.

Not my picture but one stolen off of google so you can get an idea. I was too hungry to get the camera and take a picture before I snarfed it.

Love love love

I absolutely love this artist - Cassandra Rhodin
http://www.agentbauer.com/#/cassandrarhodin
She has some beautiful little watercolor-ish looking images



Well kids, i have a caprese pizza in the oven and i'm getting hungry so have a great night!