Veni Vidi Pizza

Pizza pictures!

Pizza dough on the stone, ready to be baked

Baked dough

Baked dough closeup

Topped and ready to bake

Done baking and ready to eat.

The Pizza Crust Recipe

The basic recipe came from some book on pizzas, but I don't remember which book anymore.

• 1 cup warm water
• 1 package yeast
• some salt
• seasonings (see the previous entry)
• 1/4 cup corn meal
• 1/4 cup oil
• flour (don't ask me how much - enough to make dough)

Mix everything but the flour first. Then add enough flour until it can be kneaded. Then knead it for a while.
Let it rise for half an hour. Then form it on a pizza stone, or in a cast iron skillet.
Stick in the oven (anywhere from 350-400 works fine) for 10 minutes or so, until the crust is somewhat done (doesn't need to be completely done since it will go back in the oven)
Top the baked crust with whatever your pizza-topping heart desires, and put it back in the oven until done.

Lately I've been buying varied grains and flours and adding them to the crust - whole wheat, buckwheat, milled flaxseed, soy flour. Soy flour smells rather strong when mixing it, but isn't very strong after baking. (To me the soy smells like a nice alfalfa bale)

Next entry: Pizza making in pictures.

Mark's Pizza Secrets Revealed

Secret #1 - Season the crust. I'm not sure why more people/pizza places don't do this. The crust is usually a neutral vehicle for topping delivery, but it doesn't have to be. I use oregano, basil, and red pepper as the basic seasonings in the crust. Other crust additive possibilities include garlic powder, chili powder, and chopped onions. I haven't been brave enough to add chocolate chips (yet!).

I was recently introduced to a new solution to the excess plain crust problem at Beau Jo's Pizza. They make a more bread-like crust and provide squeeze bottles of honey to put on the extra crust. Very tasty!

Secret #2 - Bake the crust before putting the toppings on For my recipe, this serves a couple of purposes. First, the crust gets done faster (and more completely) if it's not in contact with wet tomato sauce. Second, the crust rises better if not weighed down by the toppings.

Secret #3 - There is no secret #3. If there were a third secret, it would be the toppings, but I don't have anything special to improve upon normal pizzas. Although using good Wisconsin cheese helps.

Coming next entry: The recipe!