The good pizza

the good pizza, originally uploaded by kitschenette.

The pizza recipe from The River Cottage Family cookbook is excellent - I've made it every week since I got the book at Christmas. The recipe itself is simple, and I'm sure it's not so different to other pizza recipes, but, well, I'm particularly enamoured of this one at the moment. I think it's the teaspoon of sugar and no salt in the tomato sauce that does the trick. Last night I made this pizza and we had a pizza picnic in front of the telly watching this, complete with picnic blanket and paper napkins. The kiddies loved it.

Fabulous Pizza, courtesy of The River Cottage Family Cookbook.

Dough:

500g strong white flour
2 tsp salt
1 sachet dry yeast (fast-action)
2 Tbsp olive oil + more for greasing the bowl
2 tsp honey or sugar
300 ml (approx) of warm water

how:

- Tip the flour, yeast and salt into a big mixing bowl and stir.
- Spoon olive oil and sugar/honey into a mixing jug and top up with warm water to just over 300 ml. Stir well to dissolve the sugar/honey.
- Make a well in the centre of the flour and slowly pour in the oily water.
- Mix and then knead until as soft and elastic as a baby's bottom.
- Wash out the mixing bowl and brush with olive oil.
- Place the dough inside and cover with clingwrap. Leave in a warm place for a couple of hours until it has at least doubled in size.

Sauce:

tin of chopped tomatoes
1 Tbsp olive oil
1 clove of garlic, crushed or finely chopped
1 tsp sugar

how:

- Tip the tomatoes into a pan with the olive oil and garlic and sugar, adn cook over a medium to high heat, letting the tomatoes bubble furiously until the liquid has more or less evaporated. Don't forget to stir everyonce in a while to stop the sauce sticking.

Putting it all together:

- When you are ready to make the pizza, get all your toppings ready and punch down the dough in the bowl.
- Pre-heat the oven to HOT.
- Tip out the dough onto a lightly floured surface and rollor press out into desired shape.
- Place onto an oiled baking tray and smooth over the tomato sauce.
- Scatter over your choice of toppings: we like sliced ham or salami, marinated artichokes, mushies, a few cumbles of roquefort or other stinky blue cheese, as well as thick slices of mozzarella cheese torn into pieces and scattered around the pizza.
- Sprinkle over a little sea salt and pepper. You can also add dried herbs at this point if you like, but we tend not to. Finally, drizzle over a very little olive oil.
- Bake in a hot oven until golden and bubbling and the crust has browned in places.
- Slice and eat immediately!!!

Comments

[From Our Kitchen]

That pizza looks sooo good. The salami (?) looks really crispy, just the way I like it.

[ooishigal]

Great recipe!
Thank you!

[shaz]

hi there. Nice photos you got. You got a really good eye for nice shots. I added your blog as a link on mine. I hope you dun mind. Shaz, a fellow food blogger from Singapore.

[Lushlife]

I tried the dough last night, my husband gave me a 9 out of ten, it really does make a lovely base. Look forward to experimenting with some non-traditional toppings though I have already done a zucchini, feta and garlic one last night.

[Kristina]

Hi, just browsing through your blogs and I love them! Lucious pictures and adorable kids--hope you don't mind if I link you to my own site.
Cheers!