Bother

Pizza is one of my all time favorite things to eat, and I rarely get tired of it. I will eat, and even like, frozen pizza from the grocery store. I'm of the belief that some pizza is better than others, but there's no such thing as bad pizza.

I have made homemade dough before, and I wasn't crazy about it. So I didn't see much of a point to making your own dough, until one night I was at my friend's house. She made the best pizza dough I have ever tasted. The recipe is as follows:

C's Pizza Dough

Ingredients:

3 cups flour, separated

2 tsp quick rising (instant) yeast

1 tsp salt

1 1/4 cups hot (120 F) water

1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil

1) Mix together 2 3/4 cup flour with yeast and salt

2) Gradually add water and oil until dough forms

3) Knead dough adding remaining flour 1 tbsp at a time until dough is smooth & elastic

I use my stand mixer for this part, using the wire whisk for step 1 and 2, and the dough hook for step 3.

4) Place in a greased bowl, and turn dough so it's greased on all sides. Cover (feel free to use non stick spray for the greasing, and you can cover with cling film or a kitchen towel)

5) let the dough rise in a warm place for 1 hour, or in the fridge for one day

6) punch down dough. Roll out to 14", sprinkle pan with cornmeal, top pizza, and bake for 20 minutes at 425 F

Couple things to remember. You want to use a fine cornmeal. One time my friend bought cornmeal that wasn't very fine and it was like trying to break up rocks with your teeth. While it was still a very good pizza, and a hilarious moment, it is better to have fine cornmeal.

Also this pizza dough can be ruined if you're not paying attention. I used 1 3/4 cup water, instead of 1 1/4 cups the second time I made it. I just added more flour to make up for it (as I wasn't about to waste 3 cups of flour by throwing it out and starting over), but since this is a baking recipe it did change the dough. Instead of being easy to roll out, it was tough, and the pizza crust was heavy and hard instead of light and fluffy. So follow the recipe carefully.

As for toppings, the sky is the limit. I used a ready made pizza sauce, pizza pepperoni, hot Italian sausage (casings removed, and browned up like ground beef), mushrooms, bell pepper, onion, and mozzarella cheese. I also use Real Bacon. As in the heavily processed, bacon-like product in a jar. It holds up really nice in the oven.

Trust me, this dough is super easy to put together and the result is amazing. The dough is airy, and fluffy, but still crisp on the outside.