P is for Passion, and Pizza!

Friday night is Pizza Night. I've been making pizza for years, all the while perfecting my technique for stretching dough, topping dough, transferring said dough to a hot stone in the oven, and mastering the time and temperature needed for near perfect pizzas. Not every pizza I've made is a masterpiece and since I buy my dough from a store not every dough ball is the same out of the bag, but I'm getting ready for that day in the not too distant future when I build a wood fired pizza oven in my back yard. Until that time I'll continue to make the best pizzas I can taking inspiration from local pizzerias like Emma's Pizza and Za Restaurant as well as blogs like The Wednesday Chef and Slice.

I always try to use the best ingredients possible, almost always making my own sauce and buying fresh and sometimes organic toppings when possible and reasonable. I do still buy my dough from either Trader Joe's or Whole Foods even though I have a bag of Tipo 00 flour in my pantry. Tipo 00 flour is an Italian flour that is higher in gluten (protein) than all-purpose flour and is also milled more finely. These properties allow for easier dough stretching and help create a chewier, crispier crust than doughs made with all purpose flour. The doughs from Trader Joe's and Whole Foods also have very different properties. The Trader Joe's dough is more prone to tears while I'm stretching it but it is much easier to stretch into a really thin crust. I primarily use Trader Joe's dough and have gotten quite good at stretching it without tearing. The Whole Foods dough is much more elastic and much less likely to tear while stretching but it is also much more difficult to stretch it really thin, if you like doughy pizza, try the Whole Foods dough. The Whole Foods dough is also much more prone to bubbling while it bakes. I prefer the Trader Joe's dough, do you have a favorite? Do you make your own dough?

To cook my pizzas, I place a pizza stone in the bottom third of my oven and crank the heat up around 500 degrees. The stone I have now is from Williams-Sonoma and is my third; it's by far the best I've had, going on six years. It's very important to put the stone in a cold oven and allow it come up to temperature with the oven. Putting a cold stone in a hot oven will inevitably lead to it's demise, sometimes in spectacular fashion with it cracking into dozens of pieces. Experimenting with different locations has led me to believe that in my oven, the lower third produces the crispiest crusts, which is what I'm after. Placing the stone higher in the oven will cook the top faster leaving a chewier, sometimes limp dough depending on what's on top of it. Experiment for yourself to find the ideal location for your pizza stone. My pizzas almost always take between 8 and 10 minutes to cook, again, depending on what toppings are on the pizza. For transferring the dough to the oven, I dust a wooden pizza peel (paddle) with corn meal.

Maybe someday I'll open a pizza place of my own, one can dream, can't he? Until then, I'll make pizzas in my oven, and soon, I hope, in my very own backyard, wood-fired, pizza oven. To see my next pizza creation, follow me on Twitter but until then, enjoy some of the pizzas from my very own Pizza Hall of Fame.

Bacon, Yukon Gold, Manchego, Cilantro, Basic Tomato Sauce, Truffle Oil

Smoked mozzarella, Cured Black Olives, Rosemary Sauce
 

Applegate Farms Pepperoni, Provolone, Basic Tomato Sauce

Caramelized Onion, Sweet Potato, Baby Spinach, Buffalo Mozzarella, Crumbled Goat Cheese, Basic Tomato Sauce

Apple, Pear, Caramelized Onion, Honey, Goat Brie, Walnuts, Olive Oil

Shredded Buffalo Chicken, Red Onion, Scallion, Manchego, Basic Tomato Sauce

Shredded BBQ Rotisserie Chicken, Red Onion, Scallion, Manchego, Barbecue Sauce

Caramelized Onion, Arugula, Brown Turkey Figs, Crumbled Goat Cheese, Olive Oil, Aged Balsamic

Melted Leeks, Thyme Roasted Cremini, Buffalo Mozzarella, Pecorino, Rosemary Sauce

Goat Gouda, Crumbled Goat Cheese, Cracked Black Pepper, Rosemary Sauce

Lemon-Garlic Green Olives, Sheep Feta, Crumbled Goat Cheese, Cracked Black Pepper, Garlic Olive Oil

Truffled Shitake Mushroom, Buffalo Mozzarella, Fresh Sage, Olive Oil, Truffle Oil

Pepperoni, Manchego, Pecorino, Oregano, Basic Tomato Sauce

Do you have a favorite pizza? Please leave a comment a share your passion for pizza!

Pizza Night!

Pizza. It's a food of love as one of the Food Network celebrity chefs would say. Good old fashioned comfort food. And tonight, it's home made! I got the idea from my friend Mike who said he was making pizza with his wife, so thanks Mike.

I stopped in to Trader Joe's on my way home from work to pick up all the fixin's. I bought a bag of ready made pizza dough ($.99) from the refrigerated case, a block of Manchego cheese ($5.19), a package of pepperoni ($2.69), a package of grilled chicken strips ($5.69), and a jar of Trader Giotti's Pizza Sauce ($1.89). I already had Pecorino Romano cheese at home as well as dried oregano and crushed red pepper. This was going to be some good pizza and all for $16.45, about the priced you'd pay for one pizza at a fancy pizza place.

One package of dough is enough for two good sized thin crust pizzas. I removed the dough from the bag - make sure you flour your hands or the dough will stick to them - and placed it on my floured Boos board. Using my pastry scraper I divided the dough in half and began to work each half into a flat shape for the pizza. If the dough is cold, as mine was, it will need to rest and warm up before you'll be able to really stretch the dough. When cold, the dough will be very elastic and won't retain it's stretched shape very well.

Once the dough has rested for about ten minutes, I stretched it out using my knuckles underneath the dough. If you use your finger tips, you're likely to tear the dough or poke a finger through. So I stretched out my dough and placed it on our pizza peel that I dusted with cornmeal; the cornmeal will help the pizza slide off the peel and onto the pizza stone in the oven. I then spread a good coating of Trader Giotti's Pizza Sauce on the dough. J wanted to help make the pizza so she spread about a cup of shredded Manchego cheese, half a cup of grated Pecorino Romano, a healthy dose of dried oregano, crushed red pepper and freshly ground black pepper. Doesn't this pizza look great already?!

Next, J added some sliced pepperoni and pieces of grilled chicken,

and into a 450 degree oven for twelve minutes. Wow this pizza looks great!

While pizza number one (above) was in the oven, I worked on pizza number two. I used the same cheese and spice blend, but made this pizza half pepperoni and half grilled chicken, just to mix things up.

Yummy pizza on a cold Friday night. It doesn't get much better than this!