Wednesday 4 March 2015

Fast(ish) Pizza

We love home made pizza but making a proper yeast dough takes time, even in the breadmaker. My other half runs a cooking group at work but there's no time to make a "proper" dough, cook and eat within 2 hours. Somewhere on the internet she found an alternative recipe. In fact, it's similar to a recipe for a Flammkuchen base I brought back from my last visit in Germany. So lately, we've been making a lovely, crusty pizza base with baking powder. We like it so much we're having pizza once a week these days.

With regards to the topping, we use a "standard" method: drained chopped tomatoes out of a tin and sautéd vegetables. We vary the veg, the cheeses, the meats (see the picture legends for details). I do recommend using drained tinned tomatoes rather than tomato purée which IMHO is vile as a pizza "sauce". Plus, it goes black in those areas that aren't covered with topping.

The recipe below is from a couple of days ago. Feel free to get creative or check out the photos and captions at the end of this post, which I keep adding.

BTW, for two servings we use just 300 g of flour but roll it out very thinly so it still covers most of the tin.

Base:
400 g plain flour
1/4 tsp salt (the original recipe calls for 1 tsp of salt, which we find far too much)
2 tsp baking powder
150 ml water
olive oil for brushing

Topping:
1 tin of chopped tomatoes, drained of all the juice
freshly ground pepper
grated garlic
1/2 chili, deseeded
dried herbs (basil, oregano or Herbes de Provence)
1/2 courgette, cored and cut into strips
1/2 aubergine, cut into strips
1 pointed red pepper, cut into strips
1 bunch of spring onions, but into 4 cm pieces
1/2 chili, sliced
garlic, grated
freshly ground pepper
sea salt
1/2 avocado, sliced
1 mozzarella, cut into thin slices
1 kabanossi sausage, thinly sliced
parmesan shavings
olive oil


Mix flour, salt, baking powder and water until most of the water is absorbred. Then put on a floured worktop and knead until just workable and spreadable. This takes about 2 minutes. Add a little more water, if necessary, to achieve the desired consistency

Roll out on a floured surface and line your baking tray. Brush the dough with some olive oil to prevent the tomatoes from soaking in.

Sauté the courgette, aubergine, pepper, spring onion, garlic and chili in a little olive oil for about 10 minutes at a medium heat.

Mix the tomatoes, garlic and chili and season with pepper. Spread onto the base. Place the mozzarella slices on top of the tomatoes, then scatter the sautéd vegetables, kabanossi and sliced avocado over the mozzarella. Bake at 220 °C/gas mark 7 for 15 minutes. Scatter the parmesan over the top and bake for another 5 minutes.


Sautéd red onion and mushrooms, mozzarella slices and feta, chopped up cooked ham/ham sausage/Schinkenwurst, uncooked green asparagus, halved lengthways, drizzled with oil and seasoned with a touch of salt and pepper.
Sautéd red onion, pointed red and yellow peppers, salami slices (quartered), crumbled feta cheese.
Thinly spread tomato sauce, sautéd onion, red onion, red pointed pepper, quartered slices of salami-style chorizo, gorgonzola, fresh, finely chopped rosemary

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