Pizza - Edit for pictures....
Well, firstly allow me to apologize for the long silence. There has been a fair amount of disruption going on around here that has been keeping me very busy. Net access has been limited and time has been required elsewhere. In addition to those complications, it is heading up to the culmination of the fencing season and I am trying to get myself and several other folks ready to travel to Miami for the national championships. But enough excuses, I promised you a food post.
This was I admit one of my less successful efforts on the cooking stage. I made some mistakes that compromised the final result in appearance if not in taste.
I was making pizza. The recipe for the dough I got from the March issue of Bon Appetit
. It was a pizza recipe from Giada de Laurentiis of current popularity on the Food network.
The dough is quite simple, you need:
¾ cup warm water
1 envelope dry yeast
2 cups flour
1 teaspoon sugar
¾ teaspoon salt
3 tablespoons of olive oil.
You start by stirring the yeast into the warm water and letting it dissolve.
Brush a large bowl lightly with olive oil. Mix the flour sugar and salt. (the magazine says in a processor, I just used a whisk and a bowl) Add the yeast mixture and the 3 tablespoons of olive oil, mix until you have a sticky ball. Transfer this ball to a lightly floured surface and knead until smooth. Add a little flour if it is very sticky. Transfer dough ball to the prepared bowl, (note: this step got me because I had used the bowl they said to brush lightly with olive oil to mix the dough in so I had to prepare another bowl. Lesson learned: read the whole damn recipe before you start. Or they should say prepare a bowl and set it aside.) turn the dough to coat evenly with olive oil, cover and let rise for about 1 hour (until doubled in size) Punch down the dough, and roll it out into a circle from the center leaving the edges thicker.
Now I left the magazine behind. They had fancy yuppy pizza toppings. I went with my old favorite, ham and pineapple. I purchased a can of pizza sauce (the magazine said use marinara sauce) then I tore up some deli ham, popped open a can a pineapple and made things ready. And here is where I screwed up.
You are supposed to preheat the oven to 475 degree and cook the pizza for about 15 minutes. I failed to preheat the oven before making the pizza. So I had the pizza, with sauce, ham, and pineapple sitting on my cutting board for about 10 minutes while the oven was heating up. Needless to say when the oven was hot the sauce had soaked through the dough to the point where I couldn’t get it off the cutting board to put into the oven. I seriously malformed my pizza in the effort and eventually turned it into a calzone by folding it over and stuffing it drooping into the oven. It did not come out looking spectacular but it tasted pretty good. The dough was a bit breadier than I personally prefer but I liked it enough that I will try again without making the mistakes.
This was I admit one of my less successful efforts on the cooking stage. I made some mistakes that compromised the final result in appearance if not in taste.
I was making pizza. The recipe for the dough I got from the March issue of Bon Appetit
. It was a pizza recipe from Giada de Laurentiis of current popularity on the Food network.The dough is quite simple, you need:
¾ cup warm water
1 envelope dry yeast
2 cups flour
1 teaspoon sugar
¾ teaspoon salt
3 tablespoons of olive oil.
You start by stirring the yeast into the warm water and letting it dissolve.
Brush a large bowl lightly with olive oil. Mix the flour sugar and salt. (the magazine says in a processor, I just used a whisk and a bowl) Add the yeast mixture and the 3 tablespoons of olive oil, mix until you have a sticky ball. Transfer this ball to a lightly floured surface and knead until smooth. Add a little flour if it is very sticky. Transfer dough ball to the prepared bowl, (note: this step got me because I had used the bowl they said to brush lightly with olive oil to mix the dough in so I had to prepare another bowl. Lesson learned: read the whole damn recipe before you start. Or they should say prepare a bowl and set it aside.) turn the dough to coat evenly with olive oil, cover and let rise for about 1 hour (until doubled in size) Punch down the dough, and roll it out into a circle from the center leaving the edges thicker.
Now I left the magazine behind. They had fancy yuppy pizza toppings. I went with my old favorite, ham and pineapple. I purchased a can of pizza sauce (the magazine said use marinara sauce) then I tore up some deli ham, popped open a can a pineapple and made things ready. And here is where I screwed up.
You are supposed to preheat the oven to 475 degree and cook the pizza for about 15 minutes. I failed to preheat the oven before making the pizza. So I had the pizza, with sauce, ham, and pineapple sitting on my cutting board for about 10 minutes while the oven was heating up. Needless to say when the oven was hot the sauce had soaked through the dough to the point where I couldn’t get it off the cutting board to put into the oven. I seriously malformed my pizza in the effort and eventually turned it into a calzone by folding it over and stuffing it drooping into the oven. It did not come out looking spectacular but it tasted pretty good. The dough was a bit breadier than I personally prefer but I liked it enough that I will try again without making the mistakes.
posted by exMI | 07:12
7 Comments:
Looked pretty good -- until that last picture. Pizza Traumatic Stress Disorder.
Yeah, it sort of fell apart after the sauce soaked the dough. But it still tasted good.
So how do you get the dough cripsy on the outside, and chewy on the inside (where it's thick around the edge)? Seems like it would need high-protein flour and lots of kneading to get all stretchy.
I have Giada's first book. Love the pictures. :)
I've made pizza before, and man, it's a lot of work. I'll probably end up buying this book.
If you click the link in my post and buy it you will make me a little bit of money. (hint hint beg.....)
That's almost as good as the saran wrap we left on the turkey legs at a barbarian feast oh so many years ago...
Slightly different cooking malfunction there and that wasn't my doing or my fault.
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