Pizza Monday's

We usually make pizza on Monday's - that was until Monday became Cam's late night at school. So now it is just whenever I don't have anything planned for dinner as I always have pizza stuff around.

Pizza Dough

1 tbls yeast
1 tsp sugar
3/4 cup water
2 cups flour
1/2 tsp salt
1 tbls olive oil

Opt.
cornmeal
garlic salt

Preheat oven to 475 with pizza stone (opt)

Mix together yeast, sugar, and water - let sit until bubbly.
Meanwhile, mix flour, salt and olive oil (I use my kitchen aid).
Add water/yeast mixture to flour.
Add more water until you have a nice soft dough.

This is a quick pizza dough, so you can go right to rolling it out and topping. If I have time, I like to let mine rise for about 10 minutes.

Roll out, place on oiled/cornmeal dusted pizza pan. Brush crust with olive oil and sprinkle with garlic salt. 

Top as desired.

Cook for 8-12 minutes - or until the crust is golden brown and the cheese is melted and starting to brown.

Grilled Pizza's

I've always wanted to try grilling pizza - it just sounds delicious. Little did I know just how easy it was!

I found a recipe for dough for the grill:

Grill Dough

Ingredients:

• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 1/2 teaspoon white sugar
• 1 (.25 ounce) package active dry yeast
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 2 tablespoons cornmeal for dusting
• 3/4 cup warm water (110 degrees F/45 degrees C)

Directions:

• Proof yeast in warm water and 1/2 teaspoon sugar (just stir together and leave until bubbly - about 5-10 min)
• Mix all other ingredients together, create a well in the middle and add the water and yeast - mix until elastic (knead by hand or in a mixer)
• Let rise for 1 1/2 hours (should be about double)
• Punch down and divide - makes about 4 - 8 in pizza's
• Roll out on floured surface until pretty thin (I rolled them all out and stacked them between wax paper to take them all out to the grill)

Then we tried out several different kinds of pizza's.

Grilling

• spray grill with cooking spray
• brush olive oil on one side of dough and place on the heated grill (I put one side on high and one on low - used low side to until the dough started to bubble just slightly and then the hot side to get it crispy)
• once one side is done, remove from grill, brush uncooked side with olive oil, turn over and put the toppings on the cooked side (have I lost you yet?) - think minimal toppings - with the crust so thin it goes pretty far and it cooks better with little sauce and cheese so it doesn't get soggy 
• Return to grill uncooked side down (return only to the low side as it needs time for the toppings to warm and melt) - watch the pizza carefully as it goes from done to too-done very fast.

My favorite type of pizza:

PESTO PIZZA

Topped with: Pesto, feta cheese, black olives, and chopped tomatoes (green peppers were on there but I wasn't loving them)

Clearly the types of pizza you can make are endless and this thinner crust is perfect for stronger flavors like this pesto and feta - I had thought of a white pizza with either ranch or Alfredo, BBQ Chicken, or even a spinach artichoke dip as a base - oh my mouth is watering just thinking about all these options!

The other thing we coupled our meal with was Pizza Factor Breadsticks - at least our attempt at them.

Pizza Factory Breadsticks

These are even easier  (although not quite on the money yet)

Dough:

Rhoads Rolls (2 per breadstick)

Glaze:

2-3 Tbsp melted butter

1/4 tsp garlic salt
1/4 tsp garlic powder
1/4 tsp dill weed (I replaced with half parsley and half oregano -or even some basil would work)

Directions:

Let the dough rise until double

knead 2 rolls together and rub between hands to create a snake

start at one end of a large bamboo skewer and wrap around

place on cake pan (this way there won't be a flat bottom)

let rise again until about double again

Cook at 350 for about 15 min

brush with glaze and top with Parmesan cheese

Mine kind of stuck to the skewer so I thought of soaking them in olive oil (which I'll try next time)

I have since found a recipe to make these from scratch that I may try sometime, but these are so easy with no dough prep.

I hope you enjoy all these things as much as we did. I'm already dying for that pesto pizza again.

Party Idea: I think this pizza could be so fun for a dinner party. You can set up a buffet table with different sauces, cheeses, veggies, and other toppings. It would be so delish, each person can make them to their own taste, and if you are creative (which I'm not) I'm sure the buffet table alone could be the highlight of the party.

Bagel Pizza's

Need a quick dinner idea? Have too many left over bagels from our last cooking attempts?

I have the perfect (and most delicious) solution - I know this isn't even all that original, but we made them the other night and they were so delicious I just had to share.

Bagel Pizza's

Ingredients:

Bagel of choice

Pizza sauce (our favorite featured below)Mozzarella 

Pepperoni

Any other toppings of choice

Directions:

Heat oven to 350

Cut bagel, top with sauce, toppings and cheese (we like our cheese on top so it holds everything on)

Add any spices you might like (garlic salt, red pepper flakes, etc)
Bake for about 10 min (mostly to warm the bagel)

Turn the oven to broil and watch until they turn bubbly and brown (about 5-7 min)

We like to make homemade pizza stuff alot so we usually have these things on hand which makes this meal that much easier. I have fallen in love with this pizza sauce too. It actually tastes like pizza sauce and not just totmato sauce imposing as pizza sauce. This squeeze bottle makes it that much easier to keep on hand (it doees come in a can but as you can imagine you don't always use it all hence the ease of the bottle). You can usually find it down the mexican isle by the taco stuff (I don't know why they store their pizza stuff there).

If you can't tell I always love a quick meal but one that tastes good. This definately hit the mark.

Windy City Style

A few years ago while visiting Chicago I tasted the famed Chicago Style Deep Dish Pizza. Let me tell you, it has its reputation for a reason.

I haven't had it since and don't think I even know of somewhere around here that serves Chicago Style Pizza. So naturally I decided to tackle it myself.

I've never been a fan of homemade pizza so I wanted to make sure I did it right - I did a lot of research! I read tons of dough recipes, tips, tricks, and musts. After my thorough reading, I dove right in! So here you have it:

Chicago Style Pizza

Dough

Ingredients:

3 1/2 C Flour

1 1/2 C Water

1/2 C Yellow Cornmeal

1/2 C Canola Oil (I just used vegetable oil)

1 tsp Sugar

1 tsp Salt

2 1/4 tsp  Active Dry Yeast

Directions:

24 hours prior to baking:

Mix water, sugar, yeast, flour, cornmeal,  and salt.

Mix at a low speed until  the dough comes together and then slowly add oil. Mix for 7 more minutes (in my reading I read that the less you knead the dough the more biscuit like your crust will be - which is more authentic to Chicago, but you may want it more "bread" like - I only mixed for 2 minutes).

Form the dough into a ball and place in a bowl - loosely cover with plastic wrap and then a dish towel and refrigerate over night.

One hour prior to baking:

Get the dough out of the fridge about an hour before baking.

Preheat the oven at least 30 min if not more at 450 (also in my research, everyone raved about a pizza stone - so we splurged for $13 (at target) and got one - I'M A BELIEVER! If you use one, make sure it is in the over for about an hour to preheat)

Once the dough has "rested" for and hour coat the bottom of a 15 X 2 deep dish pan (I bought a 12 x 2 cake pan from Michael's for $6.50 w/coupon - but this left dough over for garlic knots- Yum!) with regular olive oil (the recipe says specifically not extra virgin and I also added some cornmeal for the crust)

Place the ball of dough in the middle and spread out to the edge and then use your fingers to pinch it up on the edge (should be about 1/8" thick)

Now comes the toppings!

This is the trademark of Chicago pizza - you top it backwards!

Cover the bottom of the dough with sliced mozzarella (I just bought the ball of mozzarella and sliced it to my liking - which was a bit thicker)

Next add whatever toppings you might like (we did pepperoni and sausage)

Now comes the sauce (I was nervous about this, but it turned out AWESOME!)

One large can of crushed tomatoes (I think about 26 or 28 oz)

Spoon over the top of your pizza

Season with Italian seasoning, oregano, basil leaves, garlic salt (all to your taste - but since they are plain tomatoes I would suggest more than you think)

Sprinkle some Parmesan cheese.

Cook for 20 to 25 minutes (turning half way through) or until golden brown (this is where the pizza stone is genius - since it has been heating for an hour it distributes heat evenly on the bottom of the pan and cooks the crust evenly - which always seems to be the problem with homemade pizzas)

Let cool for about 5 minutes before serving

Doesn't that look delicious! I must say I was a bit impressed with it.

Ideas/Tips:

• Use the extra dough for garlic knots as a perfect addition to this meal
• My crust seemed to get a little thick right around the bottom edges - make sure to get it all even.
• I will for sure add olives or jalapenos or something - just the meat made it seem a bit lasagna-y

This was a bit more difficult/time consuming meal but I already can't wait to make it again - Anyone want to come over for a pizza night?

I want to make sure credit is given where credit is due - so I got this recipe here.