My first entry for the Sweet Punch event … This month’s challenge was Pizza. Initially had planned to make the sauce for the base , but never got to do it … So its old n faithful tomato ketchup this time.. And I had wanted to try out another variation for toppings, which too didn’t work out as it was quite a hectic month.. Hopefully some other time would bake a pizza with homemade sauce and another set of toppings …
As I was preparing the crust for baking , my son got excited and wanted to help me with the toppings.. He helped in slicing the sausages, sprinkled the toppings and impatiently waited in front of the oven till the pizza was ready … 🙂 … The crust behaved well.. Happy with the end result :).. Thank you Divya for this challenge…
IngredientsFOR THE CRUST (MAKES TWO CRUSTS):
- 1 teaspoon Active Dry Or Instant Yeast
- 4 cups All-purpose Flour
- 1 teaspoon Kosher Salt
- ⅓ cups Extra Virgin Olive Oil
For the toppings (for one pizza)
- Cubed Onions – 1
- Cubed bell peppers (green,yellow and red) – 1 each
- Sausages sliced- 4
- Sliced Black olives – 10
- Mozarella cheese – to spread on the pizza
- Dried Oregano powder – 2 tsp
- Dried bay leaves – 1 tsp
- Tomato sauce
*I sauted the onions , bell peppers and sausages on high flame for 2-3 minutes.
To Make Crust
- Sprinkle yeast over 1 1/2 cups warm (not lukewarm) water.
In a mixer, combine flour and salt. - With the mixer running on low speed (with paddle attachment), drizzle in olive oil until combined with flour.
- Next, pour in yeast/water mixture and mix until just combined.
- Coat a separate mixing bowl with a light drizzle of olive oil, and form the dough into a ball.
- Toss to coat dough in olive oil, then cover the bowl tightly with plastic wrap and store in the fridge until you need it. ***It’s best to make the dough at least 24 hours in advance, and 3 or 4 days is even better.
- Sprinkle your pizza stone or baking sheet with cornmeal/semolina
- Roll out the pizza to your liking[thin/thick].
- Spread the tomato sauce, followed by a generous amount of mozzarella cheese.
- Add the sauted onions, bell peppers and sausages. Add the sliced olives.
- Sprinkle some more mozzarella cheese on top.
- Toss in the dried oregano and bay leaves powder.
- Preheat oven to the maximum temperature[ideally 500F,but since many ovens have the maximum temperature as 200C,that would be fine too].
- Bake for about 10-15 minutes or till the cheese starts bubbling and the pizza is evenly cooked/browned.
- Slice into wedges and serve!
Foodie Corner 
