Pizza Napoletana

This week in the Bread Baker's Apprentice Challenge, we made the 25th bread in the challenge: Pizza Napoletana. Wow! Have we really made that many breads? My, how time flies while you're having fun, as the saying goes...

I love making pizza! I've been really psyched about trying this one.  I agree with Peter Reinhart's contention that it is the crust, not the toppings, that make a good pizza.  For some time now, I've been on a quest to find Pizza Nirvana, and I do believe this pizza crust has earned a place on my list of favorites.

Some of my other favorite pizzas are: Bread Machine Deep Dish Pizza prepared in a bread machine and baked in a La Cloche, No Knead Deep Dish Pizza made with a mixture of all-purpose and Semolina flours and baked in a 9" x 13" pan, and Brick Oven-Style Pizza made with a poolish and baked on a baking stone.

According to Peter Reinhart, "the single biggest flaw in most pizza dough recipes is the failure to instruct the maker to allow the dough to rest overnight in the refrigerator.  This gives the enzymes time to go to work, pulling out subtle flavor trapped in the starch.  The long rest also relaxes the gluten, allowing you to shape the dough easily, minimizing the elastic springiness that so often forces you to squeeze out all the gas." 

This Pizza Napoletana is similar to brick oven pizza in that it utilizes a poolish but it seems to have a smoky flavor.  Or, maybe it's because I rolled the dough too thin and it got a little burnt on the bottom. I don't know, but it sure was good!   All I know is that pizzas made with a poolish are so much better that there really is no comparison. I really liked this pizza and so did my taste tester.


Pizza Napoletana
I used the pizza dough from the Bread Baker's Apprentice by Peter Reinhart.

Before we get to the pizza crust, let me tell you about my favorite pizza sauce.  I've also been on a quest to create a homemade pizza sauce that is worthy of all of these wonderful crusts.  I found a combination I like.  It has a little kick to it which my sons and I really enjoy.

Here is my go to pizza sauce recipe. It's a combination of a couple of different recipes. It makes enough to top several medium pizzas.

My Favorite Pizza Sauce Recipe

• 1 teaspoon olive oil
• 1 cup finely chopped onion
• 5 garlic cloves, minced
• 1/4 cup white wine
• 2 tablespoons tomato paste
• 1 teaspoon dried oregano
• 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes (you can add more if you like)
• 1 bay leaf
• 1 (28-ounce) can crushed tomatoes, undrained (or you can use fresh tomatoes if in season).
• 1 tablespoon chopped fresh basil (or use dried basil if you prefer)
• 1 teaspoon balsamic vinegar (I usually add a little more because I like the flavor)
  
  

Directions:

Heat a skillet over medium-high heat. Add 1 teaspoon olive oil to pan. Add onion; sauté 3 minutes or until tender. Add garlic to pan; sauté 30 seconds. Stir in wine; cook 30 seconds. Add tomato paste, oregano, black pepper, salt, crushed red pepper flakes, bay leaf and tomatoes and bring to a boil.

Reduce heat, and simmer for 15 minutes or until thick. Then stir in basil and vinegar and cool. It took about 30 minutes for my sauce to thicken. It also cooked down a good bit. This makes a chunky sauce so if you prefer a smooth sauce, you can puree it in the blender. I like it either way but my taste tester prefers the sauce smooth so I usually puree it.  Feel free to experiment.


Now on to the pizza crust....


Making the Pizza

On the day you want to make the pizza, remove the desired number of dough balls from the refrigerator 2 hours before making the pizza. 

Dust the counter with flour, and then mist the counter with spray oil.  Place the dough balls on top of the floured counter and sprinkle them with flour; dust your hands with flour.  Gently press the dough into flat disks about 1/2 inch thick and 5 inches in diameter.

Sprinkle the dough again with flour, mist it again with spray oil, and cover the dough loosely with plastic wrap or a food-grade plastic bag.  Let rest for 2 hours.

Baking the Pizza

45 minutes before making the pizza, place a baking stone on the lowest rack of the oven.  At least that's where it works best for my oven.  Preheat the oven as hot as possible (500 to 550 degrees).  I baked the first pizza at 550 degrees and it burned a little bit so I lowered the temperature to 500 degrees for the second one and that seemed to work out better.  If you don't have a baking stone, you can use the back of a sheet pan, but don't preheat the pan.

Generously dust a peel or the back of a sheet pan with semolina flour or cornmeal.  I used cornmeal.  Make the pizzas one at a time.  Dip your hands, including the backs of your hands and knuckles, in flour and lift 1 piece of dough by getting under it with a dough scraper.


I'll just let you know right now that I didn't shape the pizza exactly the way the book describes.  I still don't have the hang of stretching the pizza in the air and then tossing it. I did stretch it in the air a little bit, then finished stretching it on the counter.  I didn't need a rolling pin, I just used my fingers to spread the dough out.  

When you've stretched the dough enough (about 9 to 12 inches in diameter), lay it on the peel, making sure there is enough semolina flour or cornmeal to allow it to slide.  Or, you can do what I did and place the dough on parchment sprinkled with cornmeal then transfer the whole thing to the peel.  I find that much easier to manage.

I parbaked the first pizza crust for a few minutes before adding the toppings.  I didn't parbake the second pizza and we could definitely tell the difference.  We like it parbaked much better!

Lightly top the pizza with sauce and then with your favorite toppings.  In addition to the yummy pizza sauce, I topped my pizza with onions, green peppers and mozzarella cheese.

Slide the pizza onto the stone and close the door.  Wait 2 minutes, then take a peak to make sure it is baking evenly.  If necessary, you can rotate the pizza for even baking. The pizza should take about 5 to 8 minutes to bake.

 

Cooling and Serving the Pizza

Remove the pizza from the oven and transfer to a cutting board.  Wait 3 to 5 minutes before slicing and serving, to allow the cheese to set slightly.  This was the hard part!  But we managed.

 

Now it's time to enjoy some of this yummy pizza!

Thanks for joining us this week in the Bread Baker's Apprentice Challenge!  And, a big thanks to Nicole at Pinch My Salt for getting us started on this journey.  We're learning a lot and having loads of fun!

The next bread in Bread Baker's Apprentice Challenge, is Poolish Baguettes. 

 

Happy Baking!
Cathy

 

Pain À L'Ancienne Baguettes: BBA Challenge

This week in the BBA Challenge, we made Pain À l'Ancienne Baguettes using the delayed fermentation method.  You can also make pizza or Foccacia using this dough. I've been making lot's of pizza recently so I wanted to try my hand at the baguettes.

"The unique delayed-fermentation method, which depends on ice-cold water, releases flavors trapped in flour in a way different from the more traditional twelve-stage method.  The final product has a natural sweetness and nutlike character that is distinct from breads made with exactly the same ingredients but fermented by the standard method, even with large percentages of pre-ferment."

-- Peter Reinhart, The Bread Baker's Apprentice: Mastering the Art of Extraordinary Bread

Nancy Baggett utilizes a similar method in her book Kneadlessly Simple. In fact, she mentions that she got the idea from Peter Reinhart. I've made several breads using the delayed fermentation method from Kneadlessly Simple and Artisan Bread in Five Minutes. I really like this method although I'm still getting the hang of working with the wet dough.


You might also enjoy some of these other Artisan Breads.

You can find the list of ingredients for this bread in the book.

 

 

Process:

Making the Dough: (Day 1: Thursday, Oct 1st)

 

Combine the flour, salt, yeast, and water in the bowl of your electric mixer.  Mix with the paddle attachment  for 2 minutes on low speed.  Since this dough is really wet, it is best to use a mixer to mix it rather than using a spoon.

 

Switch to the dough hook and mix for 5 to 6 minutes on medium speed.  The dough will be sticky on the bottom of the bowl but should release from the sides of the bowl.  If this doesn't happen, sprinkle in a little flour or if the dough is too stiff and clears the bottom as well as the sides of the bowl, dribble in a little more water.

 

 

Transfer the dough to a lightly oil bowl using a spatula or bowl scraper dipped in water.

 

 

A rubber spatula dipped in water works well for this step.

 

 

Fermenting the Dough

 

Mist the top of the dough with spray oil and cover with plastic wrap.  Place the bowl in the refrigerator and let it retard overnight.

 

 

 

The next day check the dough to see if it's risen in the refrigerator.  It probably won't be doubled in size.  Take the bowl out of the refrigerator and let it sit at room temperature for 2 to 3 hours or longer to allow the dough to wake up, lose its chill, and continue fermenting.

 

 

I actually let my dough retard for two nights.  I didn't have time to make the loaves on Friday so I left the dough in the refrigerator until Saturday morning.  I took the dough out of the refrigerator early in the morning and let it sit on the counter for several hours until I was ready to make the loaves.

 

Here is the dough after retarding in the refrigerator for two nights.

 

 

 

This is the dough after fermenting on the counter for several hours.

 

 

 

Preparing the Dough for Shaping (Day 3: Saturday, Oct 3rd)

 

Once the dough has doubled from its original prerefrigerated size, sprinkle the counter with bread flour (using about 1/2 cup).  Gently transfer the dough to the floured counter.  Try to degas the dough as little as possible as you're transferring it. A plastic spatula dipped in water works well for this step.  You may also want to dip your hands in water as well to keep the dough from sticking to them.  If the dough is very wet, sprinkle more flour over the top as well as under it.

 

 

 

Dry your hands really well, then dip them into the flour.  Roll the dough gently in the sprinkled flour to coat it thoroughly, and stretch it into an oblong about 8 inches long and 6 inches wide. If it's too sticky to handle, continue sprinkling flour over it.

 

 

 

Dip a metal pastry scraper into cool water to keep it from sticking to the dough, and cut the dough in half width-wise.  Do this by pressing the pastry scraper down through the dough until it servers it.  Then, dip it into the water again and repeat this action until you have a clean cut down the full length of the dough. (Don't use the blade as a saw, just pinch the dough cleanly with eat cut.)

 

I performed this step three times before the cut went all the way through.  Let the dough relax 5 minutes.

 

 

Prepare the oven for hearth baking

 

Prepare your oven for hearth baking by placing a baking stone and an empty steam pan in the oven according to the instructions on pages 91-94.  Preheat the oven to 500 degrees (or 550 degrees if your oven goes that high).  My oven goes to 550 but it is a very hot oven so I only preheated it to 500 degrees.

 

When I bake hearth breads in my oven, I've found it works better to have the baking stone on the middle shelf and the steam pan on the lower shelf rather than placing the baking stone on the bottom shelf and the steam pan above it (or on the floor of the oven).  Having the steam pan underneath seems to work more effectively and keeps the bottom of the loaves from burning before the tops bake completely.  I prefer chewy loaves over crispy ones so having the baking stone on the middle shelf helps prevent the loaves from getting too crispy.  I burned several loaves of bread to a crisp before I figured this out. You'll probably want to experiment to find out what works best for your oven (and your taste preferences).

 

Cover the back of two 17 by 12-inch sheet pans with baking parchment and dust with semolina flour or cornmeal.  I have a rimless baking sheet so I just covered it with parchment and sprinkled it with cornmeal.

 

 

 

Shaping the Dough

 

Note: I didn't have enough hands to work with the wet dough and take photos at the same time so I wasn't able to capture all the steps on film.

 

 

Score the dough strips as for baguettes (refer to page 90), by slashing the tops with 3 diagonal cuts.  I used a serrated knife dipped in water.  I have a lame but the serrated knife seems to work better because it's heavier.  Since this particular dough is so wet, you might even want to use scissors to slash it.  Some of Peter Reinhart's students recommended using scissors and this is also the tool that Nancy Baggett uses in her Kneadlessly Simple method.  I had to dip the blade in water several times in between each cut to keep it from sticking to the dough.

 

 

Shaping Pain a l'Ancienne Baguettes

 

Refer to the instructions on page 193 for shaping the baguettes.

 

Take 1 of the dough pieces, and using the pastry cutter dipped in water, cut off 3 equal-sized lengths.

 

 

 

 

 

Do the same thing with the remaining half.  This will give you 6 lengths.

 

 

 

Flour your hands and carefully lift one dough strip and transfer it to a parchment-lined pan and gently pull it to the length of the pan (or to the length of your baking stone if it is smaller).  If it springs back, let it rest for 5 minutes and then gently pull it out again.

 

 

 

Place 3 strips on the pan, and then prepare another pan and repeat with the remaining strips. I put the 3 strips on the parchment paper, then transferred that to the baking sheet. That seemed to work well.

 

 

 

Take 1 of the pans to the preheated oven and carefully slide the dough (along with the parchment paper), onto the baking stone.  Or, you can bake directly on the baking pan if you prefer.

 

 

Pour 1 cup of hot water into the steam pan and close the door.   After 30 seconds, spray the oven walls with water and close the door.  Repeat this process two more times at 30-second intervals.  After the 3rd time, lower the oven setting to 475 degrees and continue baking.

 

 

In the meantime, dust the other strips of dough with flour, mist with spray oil, and cover with plastic wrap until you're ready to bake them.  You can leave them on the counter a few hours if you want a more rustic-style bread or refrigerate them until the next day if that fits in better with your schedule.

 

 

 

The bread should begin to turn golden brown within 8 or 9 minutes.  If necessary for even baking, rotate the loaves 180 degrees.  I did this to make sure they were browning on all sides.  Continue baking 10 to 15 minutes more, or until the bread is a rich golden brown.

 

 

 

Cooling the Loaves

 

Transfer the breads immediately to a cooling rack and let them cool for 20 minutes.  They should feel very light, almost airy.

 

I used a pizza peel to remove the loaves and parchment all at once.

 

 

 

 

While these loaves are cooling, bake the other loaves.  Just remember to turn the oven back up to 500 degrees to begin the process and remove the used parchment paper if you haven't already.

The loaves ready to be eaten!  They have nice holes and taste great!  Chewy just like I like them.

Thanks for joining us this week in the Bread Baker's Apprentice Challenge.

The next bread in Bread Baker's Apprentice Challenge, is Pain de Campagne.  I love this country-style French bread!   I'm looking forward to making it. 

 

Happy Baking!
Cathy

Herbed Cheese Pizza: Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes

Today in the bread-baking blog, we're continuing our pizza making series. We're making a delicious Herbed Cheese Pizza using the olive oil dough from Artisan Bread in Five Minutes.

There is a picture of a delicious herbed pizza on the front cover of the September issue of Cooking Light. I've been wanting to make this pizza for a few weeks. I decided to make it using the olive oil dough from Artisan Bread in Five Minutes rather than making the dough from the recipe. I also made homemade pizza sauce using one of my favorite recipes and incorporated some of the additional ingredients from the herbed pizza recipe. I really like the combination. Hopefully, you will too.

 

 

Here are some helpful tips and resources for making homemade pizza:

• Choose a recipe from our collection of homemade pizza recipes.
• Check out the pizza ingredients section for some special products to make your pizza taste even better.
• Browse the homemade pizza section for pizza peels, pizza stones, and other pizza pans and tools.
• Check out our selection of pizza cookbooks.
• View our selection of pizza mixes.
• Refer to the tips in the how to make pizza section.
• For more recipes and instructions, don't forget to check out the September 2008 series on making pizza in the bread baking blog.

Herbed Cheese Pizza using Olive Oil Dough

 

Make the pizza dough according to the instructions in Artisan Bread in Five Minutes.  Then place the dough in the refrigerator overnight.  You can also use your favorite pizza dough for this recipe.

 

 

Preparing the Pizza Sauce and Toppings

I combined a couple of different pizza sauce recipes to make this sauce. It makes a big batch so I froze the rest for another day. I made the sauce Sunday afternoon so we could have pizza for dinner Sunday night.

Pizza Sauce

• 1 teaspoon olive oil
• 1 cup finely chopped onion
• 5 garlic cloves, minced
• 1/4 cup white wine (I used some white wine that my friend made)
• 2 tablespoons tomato paste
• 1 teaspoon dried oregano
• 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
• 1 bay leaf
• 1 (28-ounce) can crushed tomatoes, undrained. I used fresh tomatoes that another friend of mine gave me. Just peeled them and chopped them up. I had about 32 ounces. Yummy!
• 1 tablespoon chopped fresh basil (I have fresh basil but used dried instead)
• 1 teaspoon balsamic vinegar (I used a little more because I like the flavor.)

 

Heat a skillet over medium-high heat. Add 1 teaspoon olive oil to pan. Add onion; sauté 3 minutes or until tender. Add garlic to pan; sauté 30 seconds. Stir in wine; cook 30 seconds. Add tomato paste, oregano, black pepper, salt, crushed red pepper flakes, bay leaf and tomatoes and bring to a boil.

Reduce heat, and simmer for 15 minutes or until thick. Then stir in basil and vinegar and cool. It took about 30 minutes for my sauce to thicken. It also cooked down a good bit.

This makes a chunky sauce so if you prefer a smooth sauce, you can puree it in the blender. I like it either way but my taste tester preferred the sauce smooth so I pureed it and it tasted great.

Herb Topping

• 2 teaspoons dried oregano
• 2 teaspoons ground cumin
• 1 teaspoon hot paprika
• 1/2 teaspoon coarsely ground black pepper

 

To prepare the topping, combine oregano, cumin, paprika, and 1/2 teaspoon black pepper in a small bowl. Set this aside.

Now it's time to make the pizza...

Twenty minutes before baking time, preheat the oven with a baking stone at 450 degrees F.

Get the dough out of the refrigerator. Dust the surface of the refrigerated dough with flour and cut off a 1-pound piece.

Dust the piece with more flour and quickly shape it into a ball. My dough was really wet so I shaped it on the counter (rather than in my hands) incorporating more flour as I went along.

Flatten the dough with your hands (or a rolling pin if you prefer) to a 1/8-thick round. You may need to use a dough scraper to unstick the dough and keep from adding too much flour. You may also need to let the partially rolled dough sit for a few minutes to "relax" to allow further shaping.

Place the dough on a piece of parchment or you can use a cornmeal-covered pizza peel. I find that the dough sticks to the peel too much with just cornmeal so I like to use parchment paper on top of the peel.

Slide the pizza (on the parchment paper) onto the stone and parbake for a few minutes. This keeps the toppings from making the pizza soggy.  Then top the pizza with some sauce; and the herb mixture;

Finish with slices of your choice of cheese. The recipe suggested kasseri cheese but I couldn't find it so I just used sliced mozzarella.

Slide the pizza onto the baking stone and bake it for 8 to 10 minutes, then check for doneness.  Rotate the pizza if it is browning too much on one side. Then bake for another 5 minutes or until the cheese is bubbly.

Remove the pizza from the oven and allow it to cool slightly before serving. This will give the cheese time to set. I slid mine onto a bread board to let it cool for a few minutes.

Now it's time to enjoy this delicious pizza! It has a wonderful spicy and herb flavor. I think this combination would taste really good with pepperoni but my taste tester is vegetarian so I didn't use any meat. Evenso, it was yummy!

 

You might enjoy some of these other Homemade Pizza Recipes

Happy Baking!
Cathy

Deep Dish Semolina Pizza

One of my favorite pizza recipes to make in a pinch is a no knead deep dish pizza from King Arthur Flour. The dough is made with a mixture of all-purpose and semolina flour. It's easy and tastes great!

 

I just joined the bakers in the BYOB (Bake Your Own Bread) bread wagon which means I’ll be baking my own bread for the rest of 2009 (and beyond).

 

In light of this new challenge, I decided to be creative with the pizza dough. I had some Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes Italian Semolina Bread dough that I didn't want to use for bread so I decided to use it for pizza dough.

 

Here is my version of a no knead deep dish pizza topped with pepperoni.

 

No Knead Deep Dish Italian Semolina Pizza

Makes: Two 9 x 13-inch pan pizzas

 

 

If you have some of the Artisan Semolina Bread Dough, use that as the base for this pizza.

 

The KAF recipe uses 1/2 cup of semolina flour and 2 3/4 cups of all-purpose flour. The semolina dough was 50/50 all-purpose/semolina flour, and there was enough dough for 2 loaves, so this meant I needed to adjust the dough a little bit to get the right consistency and flavor.

 

To make the pizza dough, I mixed 2 cups of all-purpose flour, 1/2 teaspoon of yeast, 2 tablespoons of olive oil, and 1 tablespoon of KAF pizza dough flavor in a large bowl.  To that, I added about a 3/4 cup of water. The semolina dough was already wet so I didn't use the full 1-1/4 cups of lukewarm water that the original recipe calls for. I also didn't add any additional salt because the semolina bread dough was pretty salty (um...I added too much salt when I made the dough, but you won't tell, right?)  Then I added the semolina dough to the flour mixture and stirred it up really well. I had to use wet hands on this one to get everything incorporated. I didn't have to knead it, just mix it real good. The dough was pretty sticky.

I mixed with my wet hands until it formed a sticky soft dough. Then, I covered the bowl with plastic wrap and let the sticky soft dough rise in the bowl for 30 minutes.

Then, I placed the dough in the pan and let it rest for about 15 minutes. After the dough is rested, you can pat and stretch it to cover the bottom of the pan. If you use wet fingertips, it works much better. It actually spreads like butter.

Spread the pizza with sauce. I usually make homemade pizza sauce but I was going for extremely easy this weekend so I just used a jar of pizza sauce that I had in the pantry. I would say that my sons wouldn't know the difference but they actually do ... guess that's a good thing.

Bake it in a preheated 450 degrees oven for 15 minutes. Remove it from the oven, and add the seasoning, cheese, and toppings. I added Italian seasoning and basil along with mozzarella cheese and pepperoni. Like I said, I made this real simple.

 

Return it to the oven and bake for an additional 10 to 15 minutes, until the cheese is bubbly and the edges are golden brown.

Let it cool a little bit before serving. That is, if you can.  I made one pizza Saturday night and put the other pan in the refrigerator overnight to make the next day. After I finished baking the pizza on Saturday, I went to visit a friend for awhile. While I was gone, My oldest son and his friend demolished the pizza pictured below. It's a good thing I had two pizzas. With a sheepish grin, he said they thoroughly enjoyed it. Although, he said the bottom was a little too brown.

The next day, I baked the other pizza in the glass pan and lowered the temperature to 400 degrees. It came out great and tasted wonderful! Not too brown...just right! Needless to say this one (pictured below) didn't last very long either.

 

I was so pleased because not only did my experiment work but it tasted great! Here's to experiments that work!

 

 

You might enjoy some of these other Homemade Pizza Recipes.

Happy Baking!
Cathy

How to make Brick Oven Pizza

You'll like this Brick Oven Pizza. The overnight starter gives it an incredibly chewy/crispy crust. It's easy to make and is one of the best tasting homemade pizza's I've had. I didn't really like thin crust pizza until I tried this version. My sons even like it and they're picky about their pizza.

Note: The first step, making the poolish, should be done the night before if you want pizza for lunch the next day. Or, if you want pizza for dinner, make the poolish in the morning and let it sit all day. Just make sure you allow enough time to make the dough.


Brick Oven Pizza
Yield: 2 pizzas

Recipe courtesy of King Arthur Flour Company and The Baker's Catalogue.

Ingredients:

Poolish (Starter)

• 1 cup Unbleached All-Purpose Flour
• 1/2 cup water
• 1/8 teaspoon instant yeast

Dough

• 3/4 cup water
• 2 1/4 cups Unbleached All-Purpose Flour
• 1 tablespoon + 1 teaspoon Pizza Dough Flavor (optional, but delicious)
• 1 teaspoon instant yeast
• 1 1/4 teaspoons salt
• 1 teaspoon sugar
• 1 tablespoon olive oil

Toppings
Tomato sauce, meats and/or vegetables, and cheeses of your choice. I plan to use red and green peppers, onions, a prepared sauce and cheeses.


Directions:

Making the Poolish:

In a mixing bowl or the pan of your bread machine, stir together the flour; water and yeast. Set aside, covered, to rest overnight or all day. I started my poolish last night so we could have pizza for lunch today.

Poolish after resting on counter all night

Making the Dough:

Add the flour and water to the poolish, mix well, and allow to rest for 20 minutes. Add the remaining dough ingredients, mixing and kneading to form a smooth dough.

Allow the dough to rise, covered, for 45 minutes; gently fold the edges to the middle, turn it over, and let it rise an additional 45 minutes.


Note: It was a very humid and hot day today so the dough was very gooey. I let the dough rise in the refrigerator the last 45 minutes. Then I was able to work with it.

Risen dough ready to made pizza

Divide the dough in half. Shape each half into a 9-inch round, place on a piece of parchment cut to fit, cover, and let rest while you heat your oven to 500°F.

This dough is very easy to work with. It spreads very nicely.  You don't even need a rolling pin.

Pizza dough covered resting on counter while oven preheats

Pizza dough ready to bake

After about 30 minutes, use a giant spatula or pizza peel to transfer the pizza to your hot oven stone; or place it on a pan on the lowest rack of your oven.  Bake for 4 minutes, then remove from the oven, and top with your favorite toppings.



Return the pizzas to the lowest rack of the oven (not to the stone), and bake for an additional 8 minutes, or until the crust is golden brown and the filling bubbly.



Nutritional Information:
Serving size 1/6 of a pizza, crust only, 50g; 124 cal, 1g fat, 4 g protein, 24g complex carbohydrates, 1g dietary fiber, 223 mg sodium, 48mg potassium, 2mg iron, 1mg calcium, 33 mg phosphorus.


Additional resources for making pizza:

• How to Make Pizza
• Pizza Recipes

Happy Baking!
Cathy