Its a tradition in our family that on Christmas Eve, we make pizzas. I've been trying to get a thinner crust on my home pizzas, but haven't gotten there yet. Cook's Illustrated just did an article in their magazine on homemade thin pizza crust recipe, and concluded that a long refrigerator rise helped greatly. So we'll work on that.
You can watch the GardenFork How to make pizza video here. And if you'd like to make a pizza peel, we have a GardenFork video on how to make your own pizza peel here.
My current recipe for pizza is a simple dough, 4 cups of bread or all purpose flour, with 1 teaspoon of yeast, ½ teaspoon of salt, 2 tablespoons olive oil and about 2 cups of warm water.
Mix the dry ingredients, then add 1 cup of the flour and the oil, mix and then slowly add enough water that you can work the dough, but its not a sticky mess.
Knead for a minute, then shape into a ball and put in a bowl covered for a few hours. After it has doubled in size, or when you're ready to make pizza, roll out your dough into 4 small pies.
Let these pies rest a bit, and you can stretch them out more if you like.
Add what sauce and toppings you like, bake in a preheated oven with tiles or a pizza stone at 500F for about 7 minutes.
Here are some photos from the Christmas Eve pizza baking.
I wanted to try mozzerella slices vs. grated, so here we go
The sliced cheese burned and wasn't great to eat
Grated cheese with mushrooms
grated cheese worked well for us
Our crust was pretty good, but the edges were pretty thick
LJC
Hi Eric,
This is the best recipe I have found for pizza dough. I've made it many times now and it is thin, crispy and guaranteed to take you to pizza heaven. It's from a blog you mentioned a while back in one of your episodes....alexandracooks. Here is the link. As we move out of winter and into spring, it would be great if you did a few gardening shows on when you plant, how you grow from seed, transplant seedlings, direct sow, thin the plants, stagger plantings, and harvest. Also, how you divide up the use of your beds and rotate crops. Lettuce, kale, chard, tomatoes, beans, carrots, zucchini, melons, squash, etc.. As a novice gardener...interested in permaculture and learning how to grow my own food in an urban setting, I think this type of basic information is very useful. Love your site, Happy New Year!
http://www.alexandracooks.com/2008/10/09/pizza-pizza/
Eric Gunnar Rochow
thanks for that. i see in Cooks magazine Jan Feb 2011 has an article on achieving thin crust pizza, it seems the key thing is to let it rise in the fridge for at least a day. will work on that later this week.
Lauren from Texas
There is a restaurant here-famous, called Campisi's Egyptian Room, which uses a flatbread for their thin crust. Perfectly crunchy, not at all cardboard-y. I want to say it is Lebanese flatbread, but looking at the name of the restaurant, maybe it's Egyptian...anyway, worth keeping your eyes open at the grocery or bakery. A multitasking bread...It's a Christmas Miracle!!!
Eric Gunnar Rochow
many foods from the middle east don't know international borders, so it may be the same bread, but has different names in different countries. thanks for letting us know about this, eri c.