Homemade pizzas

Friday night is usually our night to get takeaway – we have an amazing Thai restaurant just down the road (Thai Chada if you’re interested) and that is our standby.  However, as we are eating out a fair bit in the next couple of weeks, I decided to try my hand at homemade pizza this time.

I made the dough using this recipe.  The dough turned out well, and cooked up nicely – it was thin and crispy.  However, I don’t think it my house was hot enough and it didn’t rise as much as I would have liked.  At first it wasn’t rising at all, so I tried various places around the house with no success, and ended up putting the bowl into a sink of hot water.  This seemed to do the trick – I’ll have to remember it in future.

We made two pizzas.  Both were tomato based, although I think we probably used a bit too much tomato paste.  Into the tomato paste we mixed fresh oregano and finely chopped local garlic.  What a revelation that garlic has been – it has 10 times the flavour of bleached garlic from China, and yet has a subtle sweetness that I really enjoy.

One pizza we topped with butternut pumpkin, green capsicum, sundried tomatoes and feta cheese.   The other had fried bacon, salt-dried olives (richer and more intense in flavour than regular olives), fresh tomato, potato and parmesan.

Both pizzas cooked in about 15 minutes in our ancient oven, although it was be less in a fan-forced oven.  We served the bacon, potato pizza with a drizzle of balsamic, and enjoyed numerous pieces with a delicious Reisling (Annie’s Lane, from the Clare Valley in South Australia).

I really encourage you to have a go at making your own dough.  It’s a bit labour intensive due to the kneading, but think of it this way – you’re burning off the calories you’ll consume when you eat your pizza!