Monday 6 July 2009

Pizza my mind?

Due to the rampant heatwave here in the UK, I've not really fancied having the oven on for the past few weeks, but today my pizza lust got too much for me.

My normal pizza dough creates enough for two

125ml (1/2 cup) water
200g (1 1/2 cup) plain flour
1 tsp yeast
1 tsp salt
1 tsp olive oil

I dump all this in the breadmaker, in this order. Indent the top of the flour and add the yeast, and put the salt and oil in the corners of the bread pan. Stick this on dough, and you are good to go.

Since it's well documented that I'm unable to leave things be, I decided to throw in some flavour to the base.

1 small handful dried mushrooms
1 small handful dried tomatoes

I just threw these in a food processor, then whizzed them to crumbs, and plopped these onto of the flour. It dawned on me after, I should probably have soaked them. Meh.

Added to this
1/2 tsp dried herbs
1 pinch chilli flakes

Waiting to be processed in the breadmaker


After 90 mins in the breadmaker


I rolled the dough out, and then let it prove for about 30 mins, untill puffy and yum :)



Now, to top the pizza I had left over chilli, mushrooms, yellow peppers and button mushrooms.



I tend to blind bake pizzas as I don't like a soggy crust. For me, I just fork the base slightly, cook for 2-3 mins on one side, flip, cook for 2-3 min the other side, and then add your toppings. With thicker based, this seems to prevent it getting unpleasantly moist. I bake at 230C for 10-15 mins, and then add 'cheese' and stick under the grill again.

I also added a little toffuti cheese slices, as my husband really loves these.

Doesn't it look nice all baked up?


Also, I normally make up a little sauce to dip the pizza crusts into. Today's was a little garlic and chili sauce dipping sauce, which I added some ketchup, a little brown sauce, and then some liquid smoke. Basically, anything liquid that's in my kitchen and not nailed down ;)

I also picked some cherries from the tree by the edge of the estate, with the intention of putting them through the dehydrator, as I love dried cherries, but I'm not prepared to shell out for them. Lovely husband pitted them by hand for me :)

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