a spinoff of horses post. Pizza!!!!!

[jeff]

Pizza is one of those things, people for the most part cannot make pizza!
most any kid will tell you no matter how their mom or dad makes pizza it always taste like home made pizza. almost never does homemade pizza taste like restaurant style pizza.

First off the # 1 mistake people make is how they cook their pizza, I have a few years under me in the pizza biz and can say hands down the way you cook a pizza will change the taste and texture of the finished product.

I'll go as far to say that if you take a restaurant pizza dough, sauce, and cheese, and cook it at home in your oven, again it wont taste like the store. it will taste pretty far off from it.


Two things will aid in making home made pizza taste like it's meant to taste.

Brick Oven or seasoned pans

Chances are you don't have a brick oven but you should have a seasoned pan, you just don't know it yet.

As far as a brick oven goes you can use a pizza stone, or better yet, some cheap tile from home-depot or lowes. or if you're a handy man/woman and have bricks around the house, clean them off, and line a baking sheet with them covering however large of a space you want.

Seasoned pans are made by taking a normal NON-nonstick aluminum pan/sheet (in other words a shinny non coated pan/sheet) rub it down with some oil, dust it with flour and bake it in a 450o+ oven for 30-40 mins, wipe out the excess blackened flour and you're done. Kinda over kill for home use if you ask me.

However, there's something most every kitchen have that's already seasoned and horse touched on it. a cast iron skillet! Just make sure your skillet is (as it should be) seasoned both inside and outside.

No matter a pizza stone, tile, or a cast iron skillet, place them in the oven BEFORE you turn the oven on. I like taking a baking sheet and placing it on the bottom rack, then placing the cast iron skillet on the upper rack upside down. that way any drippings or cornmeal will be caught by the baking sheet below it.

The Recipe.

This recipe will make 2 med size pizzas. it can easily be doubled for a larger batch.

1/2 packet of instant yeast
2 TBS aka 1/8th cup warm water (100o-110o)
1/2 tsp sugar

Place the instant yeast into a small bowl, and pour the 2 TBS of water over top of it, add 1/2tsp of sugar and mix it up, let stand for 5-10 mins or until the yeast doubles in size, if nothing happens then your yeast is no good or the water was too cold/hot.

rest of the dough

2 cups flour
1/2 cup warm water
1 TBS of sugar
1 TBS olive oil +1 tsp olive oil for the bowl/dough hook
1 tsp kosher salt
some cornmeal for baking.

Sauce of your choice, home made is best but we all know how that goes =)
Cheese of your choice, freshly grated is best.
any extra toppings you would like

Once your yeast is ready.

Start off by placing half of the flour in a mixing bowl (1 cup) then add the sugar, salt, oil, and warm water, yeast mixture, then add the 2nd half of the flour (1 cup) using a mixing paddle (see images) mix the content up by hand till it just starts to come together, then place bowl on your mixer and turn on around #3 or #4 speed (kitchen aid mixer) once the dough balls up on the paddle attachement, remove the dough from the paddle and replace the paddle with a dough hook, rub the dough hook with some oil to keep it from sticking to the dough, lock the mixer in place and turn the mixer on #3-#4 speed (again kitchen aid mixer speed) let this mixture mix for about 1 minute, check the bottom of the mixing bowl, if there's a big pool of dough stuck to the bottom, add a tad bit of flour, or if theres nothing at all, add a tad bit of warm water. I like having around a silver dollar worth of dough stuck on the bottom (see image) when you know the flour/water mixture is right, leave the mixer running for a good 10+ minutes. The goal is to stretch out the proteins in the flour causing gluten this gives the dough its stretch.
after 10 minutes passes, take a small piece of dough off about the size of a small marble and roll it into a ball, mash it down and stretch it out so it makes a square and hold it up to a light, you want to be able to see thru it with out the dough tearing. If it tears, run the mixer for another 5-10 minutes.

Once the dough is ready, remove it from the mixing bowl and make it into a ball (see video 1) place it in a glass or metal bowl that has some oil in the bottom just enough oil to help keep the dough from sticking. I like to roll the dough around in the bowl to give it a very light coating of oil. From here place a glass of water in the microwave and heat it up for 2-3 minutes or till it comes to a boil, place the bowl with the dough in the microwave cover it with a towel and let it sit in there for 30-60 minutes, or until the dough doubles in size. If the dough after 1 hour hasn't doubled in size, that's ok, you can still use it, it will just be a bit more dense but still comes out tasting fine.

When your dough is about ready, go ahead and turn your oven onto 500o again, make sure you're cast iron skillet or stone is in the oven during the preheat cycle! That is a must. Also grate your cheese and get your sauce ready. (open the lid lol)

when your dough is ready, remove it from the bowl and take half of it and place it on a lightly floured counter top, mash it straight down with your hand, then pick it up and with your fingers closed, toss it from one hand to the next making sure to rotate it around so it stretches out into a circle.
If you don't like doing that, just place it on the counter top and pull it outward trying to get the middle thin and even, (about 1/8" thick) while leaving a small lip around the edge.

Once your dough is formed, take a flat cookie sheet, or in my case a flat plastic cutting board, you could even use an upside down pan... anything flat. Put a good bit of cornmeal on the board/sheet/pan and place the dough on it, grab the board/sheet/pan and move it around to make sure the dough can easily side around, if it doesnt, pick it up and add more cornmeal.

go ahead and add your tomato sauce, the key is to not over load it with sauce, add your cheese, in the pictures I used monterey jack, mozzarella, and fresh parmesan. I also sprinkled the top with some basil.

when the oven is at 500o go ahead and carefully slip the pizza onto the pizza stone or upside down cast iron skillet. give it a quick flick of the wrist and if you used enough cornmeal, it should easily come off. Check the pizza after about 6 minutes, check the color of the dough and the color of the cheese. when the pizza is ready use a big spaluta that's flattened out (see picture) or you could use anything that's thin enough to slip under the pizza yet strong enough to hold the weight. slip it under the pizza and pull it out. place the pizza on a plate to cool for about 2-3 minutes before cutting it.

While this might sound like a long and hard thing to do, making home made pizza is really simple.

When I get home from work I bloom the yeast (the first step I talked about) then I just toss the flour, salt, oil, sugar, and yeast into a mixing bowl, then let it mix while I take a shower, check e-mail and clean up around the place. when I'm done I head back to the dough and toss it in the microwave and forget about it till I'm ready to make the pizza.

After doing it a few times, I figure total time spend in the kitchen making a pizza is about 15 minutes. maybe even less if you have your kitchen laid out so everything is handy.

DO not I repeat do not place your dough on one of those crappy little round pizza pans, they will never give the crust the texture or flavor we all know pizza crust by.

Do not over sauce you pizza unless you like it wet, if you do over sauce it make sure you do the pizza thicker then normal and cook it at a lower temp so it wont burn the cheese before the thicker crust is cooked through.

Do not roll your crust out with a rolling pin unless you like crust with no edges. pizza crust is not flat.

Do make sure when you toss your pizza around you get it thin enough, you want it about 1/8" thick.

NOTE, the pizza would look more restaurant style if I were to of made it bigger. since I used a small cast iron skillet I was limited to size and made it into a smaller pizza with fat cuts rather then the thin slices people are use to seeing.

[jeff]

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[jeff]

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[jeff]

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[jeff]

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[Mike]

Thanks Jeff !

I've battled the homemade pizza for years.. Used every little trick I saw, but never really put the whole thing together like you explained it. And I know you KNOW PIZZA due to your day job... Thanks ! I'm all over this one "like white on rice" this weekend.

[jeff]

Originally Posted by Mike

Thanks Jeff !

I've battled the homemade pizza for years.. Used every little trick I saw, but never really put the whole thing together like you explained it. And I know you KNOW PIZZA due to your day job... Thanks ! I'm all over this one "like white on rice" this weekend.

If it makes you feel any better, this pizza is nothing at all like what I deal with in the day. the dough is night and day as with the sauce and cheese, oh and the style of rolling =)

however, I enjoy this pizza just as much.

[JamesTheChef]

thanks for the recipie !