Homemade Pizza, Revisited

I've made pizza often in the past, making dough from the recipe in Wildly Affordable Organic or King Arthur Flour's basic recipe. On a Smitten Kitchen kick, I decided to try her recipe. The kids rolled out the dough, so it was a bit thicker than I'd like, but the sauce was a revelation. In the past, I've just used jarred pasta sauce, but I tried her recipe which is simple - just drained canned whole tomatoes, whizzed in the food processor with a little salt and fresh garlic - and it made a huge difference.

Hawaiian Pizza, from the side

Since it has been awhile since we made homemade pizza, I forgot that I usually have the kids roll it between two sheets of parchment paper, so there was a big floury mess on the dining table when they had finished. Cornmeal also makes a superior substance to dust baking pans with, to prevent sticking.

I had leftover sauce, shredded cheese, canned pineapple, and Canadian bacon, so I made the pizza again today. The first time I followed her 22-hour recipe (starting it at night before I went to bed, for a lunch of pizza) and today I had only time for a 6-hour rise. I definitely recommend the flavor with a longer rise...although since I rolled out the dough today, it was much thinner. Also, I substituted whole wheat flour, for a proportion of 175g whole wheat flour and 200g bread flour.

kid-created pizza