PIZZA!

I've been wanting to make and post pizza on this blog since, oh, about March of this year. I'd been making it successfully for a few months, and decided to make it for my dear friend Ali (who suggested I start this blog) when she visited us in Madison. Unfortunately, that attempt was a total disaster. I somehow got the dough recipe wrong, and the pizza was un-postable. I've been pizza-shy since then.

But, joy of joys, homemade pizza is back in our lives! Homemade pizza was a New Year's Eve tradition in the Popolizio household, so I'm thrilled to have a dough recipe that works. And this time, I'm writing it down.

This was also probably the most workable dough I've made yet. The recipe below is enough for four personal, thin-crust pizzas. Your toppings are, of course, up to you - below are what our friends Matt and Marina and we decided on.

If you're going to make this, you need to plan ahead - it's simple, but not necessarily easy, and it takes some time to prep. It is also completely worth it.


DOUGH
4 1/2 cups flour
3 tsp salt
2 1/4 tsp active dry yeast (1 packet)
1 1/2 cups lukewarm water
3 tbsp olive oil

Stir your yeast into the water, and let it sit for about 10 minutes. In the meantime, combine flour and salt in a large bowl. When the water/yeast mixture is ready, add that to the dry ingredients and add the olive oil, too. Stir the mixture briefly into a rough ball - don't worry about all the pieces coming together at this point.

Dump the bowl out onto a lightly-floured surface, and knead the dough until it really is a ball, this time. Continue to knead the dough, sprinkling flour if it becomes too sticky, for 15-20 minutes. The longer the better.

To make four pizzas, cut the dough into quarters, and knead each ball individually for 2-5 minutes.

Prepare four bowls by placing a drop or two of olive oil in each and spreading it around until each bowl is lightly greased. Then put one ball of dough in each bowl, rolling it around in the olive oil to make sure it's lightly coated, too. Cover each bowl with plastic wrap and let sit for about 2 hours to rise.

After two or more hours, take each ball of dough out, pound it once or twice with your fist on a lightly-floured surface, and knead it again for 5-10 minutes. Place each ball back in its bowl and cover, repeating the olive oil process if necessary (you shouldn't have to use as much this time around - one drop if any). Let sit for about one hour to rise.

Preheat your oven to 500 degrees, with the pizza brick in the oven. Let the pizza brick get nice and hot. When you're ready to make the pizzas (we did each one individually), place the risen ball of dough on a lightly floured surface and use your hands to gradually stretch out the dough into a flat disc (you know, like a pizza) - about an 1/8 of an inch thick. I sort of rotate it, using the tips of my fingers to go around and push out the edges of the dough in a circle. You can toss it, if you like, too.

Prep a pizza "paddle" with cornmeal or semolina to keep the pizza from sticking to the paddle when you place it in the oven. Put your flattened dough onto the paddle, then add your toppings, starting with the sauce. Gently shift the pizza off of the paddle onto the brick in the oven, and cook until the crust is a light golden brown. Remove with the paddle and serve!

SAUCE
We had two sauce options: tomato sauce and garlic-habanero olive oil (guess who!). For the tomato sauce, put a couple of tablespoons of olive oil in a small pot with 2-3 cloves of chopped garlic, and heat for a couple minutes over medium. Add a little salt if you want, then add a can of tomato sauce and some dried basil. Bring to a boil, then turn down to low and allow to simmer for a bit.

For the garlic-habanero: Combine olive oil, minced garlic, and minced habanero and stir together.

TOPPINGS
We used, in a number of variations:
Arugula
Fresh mozzarella
Prosciutto
Chorizo
Cayenne pepper
Rosemary
Red chili flakes
Fresh basil leaves
Fresh tomato slices

Specifically:
THE JOEF: Garlic-habanero oil, mozzarella, basil, fresh tomato, prosciutto, salt


THE MARINA: Tomato sauce, fresh tomatoes, mozzarella, basil, prosciutto


THE MATT: Garlic-habanero oil, cayenne pepper, fresh tomatoes, mozzarella, basil chorizo


THE JULIA: Tomato sauce, rosemary, fresh tomatoes, mozzarella, basil, prosciutto; arugula (post-baking)