Everyone loves pizza!

I have made homemade pizza several times before so I thought this has got to be a must be in my blog! 

Whenever making pizza before I tried many different things, Last year I did not have a pizza baking tray or stone, so had to place on a normal tray, which lead to many very odd shaped pizzas! 

As a moving in present though, I received a pizza stone, which works a miracle. The first few times I used the stone, I ended up with more pizza stuck to the stone than in my stomach, which was a nightmare for washing up! I then tried just oil, but this let to still some sticking, so after some advice from Andrew's mum, I used both flour and oil. Worked perfectly!

Anyway, away from my failed attempts and towards a pizza I made a few weeks ago. I use the recipe from the BBC GoodFood site, with my own changes of course. Now, this pizza I made slightly different, usually I didn't bake the base before cooking the whole pizza, but as sometimes this resulted in a very doughy and chewy base, I thought I would try baking the base before placing the toppings on. It worked a bit better doing this, although next time I have learnt to keep it in the oven a bit longer until it gets a bit more brown. 

These photos show my method (feel free to change items to your taste):

1.  Add 300g of Strong Whit Bread Flour to a medium sized bowl.

2. Add 1tsp of instant yeast and 1tsp of salt, put separate sides of the bowl to prevent the salt interacting with the yeast straight away. 

3. Add 1tbsp of Olive Oil to the mixture. Sunflower oil works just as well and is more value for money.

4.Pour in around 200ml of water, you may not need all of the water though, it depends on the type of flour you use. I tend to only add a bit at a time and mix to see how much more I actually need. 

And mix all together with your hands, below pictures what the dough looks like as you continue mixing it. 

 

As you continue adding water and mixing you should end up with a basic ball shape. Then you are ready to knead the dough. 

5. Sprinkle some flour on a clean surface, alternatively you can use oil. Choose which method you prefer most. Flour is often harder to clean up afterwards and can make the dough really dry, however if your dough is quite wet, then that could be a good thing. Oil prevents the flour/water ratio being changed but at first it is a very weird substance to work with when kneading. 

6. Knead the dough on the floured or oiled surface until it becomes a soft ball. 

7. Pour a small bit of oil on to the pizza stone, if you don't have a stone the same with a tray can work. Spread the oil round, I often end up blotting the oil off with some kitchen roll, as to make sure that there is not too much excess. After placing the oil on, sprinkle evenly some flour over the top.

8. Start rolling out the dough on the surface, flip it over several times so it doesn't stick. I often only do a small bit of rolling and then use my hands to stretch the dough at the edges into a circular shape. Sometimes I will be a bit adventurous thing of flinging the dough into the air and catching it to stretch the dough, this works really well. Although try not to catch on the tips of your fingers or else you may have a dough with holes in. 

9. Place the dough on the stone, you may want to roll it out a bit on the stone, and fiddle with it a bit to get it more into shape.  

10. Place in the Oven on a medium temperature, I think I chose 180 celsius, and bake for 5-10 minutes depending on your oven. Keep an eye on the base and you can time how long you need for the texture you prefer.  

11. Here comes the fun bit! (apart from the eating part of course! :P) Get your pizza sauce, I just used passata sauce here, but you can buy actual made pizza sauces. My mum tends to use a mixture of passata, tomato puree and mixed herbs. But find a mix that is right for you. spread across the pizza, using the back of a spoon. Grate however much cheese you want and place on the top. As you can see, I like my cheese. Then add any extra toppings you fancy, some you may have to cook before hand depending on what they are. 

12. And Bake! for about 10 minutes, enough so all the toppings are cooked and the cheese is bubbling or melted. 

13. EAT!!!! (although I find myself with a burnt tongue often because I can't wait  to tuck in. 

Hope you enjoyed my basic recipe to creating your own pizza, adapted from the BBC GoodFood website, I hope to try using mozzarella someone instead of or as well as cheddar, as cheddar makes the pizza really greasy. Also may attempt a calzone pizza again which I may post. 

Happy Eating!!!!