Saturday: Homemade Pizza on Focaccia Crust

It's Saturday, so pizza and movie night! This recipe makes enough dough for 2 large pizzas, 2 small pizzas and 2 dozen breadsticks. I don't always make my own pizza crust, but when I do I like to use this focaccia crust, as it is nice and sturdy and has a nice flavour.

You will need:

2 c lukewarm water (85-105 degrees)

2 Tbsp active dry yeast (still not instant!)

1/4 c olive oil (don't use EVOO, any old cooking olive oil will do)*

1 tsp salt

1 1/2 c whole wheat flour

1 c unbleached all-purpose white flour

3 c more unbleached all-purpose white flour

Turn your oven on to it's lowest setting for one minute, turn off. Put the warm water into your enourmous bowl; sprinkle with the yeast. Add in the olive oil, salt, whole wheat flour and 1 c of the white AP flour. Stir really well, at least 100 strokes. 

100 big ones

 Add in two cups of the white flour, 1/2 c at a time.

Ready to knead

 Use the last cup of white flour for kneading, adding as needed. Give it at least 5 minutes, adding flour as it gets sticky. To knead, you will take the top part of the dough and fold it over the bottom. Push the dough with the heels of your hands. Take what squishes out the sides and fold them towards the middle. Repeat. For five minutes. I've tried to take some pictures, but it looks like all I got was an amazing view of my cheap olive oil.

Ooohhhver

Ohhhhver again

Folding in

And more in

Until it looks something like this

 Spray your bowl with oil; place the dough in it and spray it as well. Cover it with a damp tea towel (not terrycloth) or saran wrap and let it rise in the pre-warmed oven (should be OFF) for an hour.

After an hour, gently punch the dough down and let rise again for 40 minutes. Meanwhile, prepare your pizza toppings. I like to use (from upper left) red onions, mushrooms, orange pepper, broccoli, yellow pepper, garlic, jalapeno pepper, cauliflower and green peppers on my pizza. I also throw on fresh tomatoes,  but they wouldn't fit on the board.

For meat I like to use the sub sandwich trio that you can find at any store, as well as taco beef and back bacon. My husband likes weiners on his pizza, I'm not taking responsibility for that.

When your dough has risen, cut it into as many pieces as you think you need. I used half of the dough for pizza and the other half for breadsticks.

You are going to want the dough as thin as possible, as it will rise like a mofo during cooking. Use your fingers to stretch the dough out to the corners of your pan.

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees and start a-topping away. Brush the crust with olive oil before starting, then do whatever. Let your freaky pizza flag fly!

That is garlic. Mwahahahahaha!!!

Weighs 8 pounds

For the breadsticks, cut the dough into strips, brush with olive oil and sprinkle with coarse salt (like kosher) and Parmesan cheese. Let the dough rise for 20-25 minutes.

Then bake for 25 minutes, depending on your oven. Keep an eye out for the last 5 minutes to make sure your bottom crust doesn't burn.

Enjoy!

Yummy with marinara sauce

Let the kiddos make their own

Mine was amazing. No joke

*The reason I say to just use regular olive oil and not EVOO is that you will be cooking at high heat and those delicate cold pressed oils have much lower smoke points and do not hold up the way a regular olive oil does. Save those for amazing salads.