Pizza Dough

One of my favorite wedding gifts was my pizza stone and I used it to death. I recently got a new one and have been working on getting it seasoned. I know some people are just not that into making homemade pizza and I totally understand. If this is you, just ignore this post. For the rest of you, this is the pizza dough recipe I use. It is from the Williams Sonoma Pizza cookbook. I'm going to post the recipe as I make it, because I have made alterations from the original recipe.

1 T. active dry yeast
1 c.. lukewarm water
2 3/4 c. flour
1 t. salt
1 T. olive oil

Pour yeast into water in small bowl and set aside.

In a food processor(with metal blade) or Kitchen Aid mixer(with dough hook, combine flour and salt. With the machine running, slowly pour the yeast mixture into the flour mixture and continue to mix until the mixture forms a ball of dough and the dough rides around blade or hook on the mixer.

Move dough to lightly floured counter and kneed with the palm of your hand for 2 minutes.

Brush two medium sized bowls with oil. Cut dough in half and place each half in one of the oiled bowls. Cover with plastic wrap and let rise at room temperature until doubled.

Once dough is doubled, preheat oven to 450. place pizza stone in oven while preheating. For a crusty dough, you will want the stone to have been in the oven for at least 15 minutes at 450.

Turn one ball of dough out onto a flour dusted surface. Press and stretch mixture out into desired shape , flipping the dough over from time to time as you work with it. (I use a rolling pin) For a crusty pizza, roll until 1/4 inch thick. For a softer pizza roll until 1/2 inch thick.

Transfer dough to corn meal dusted pizza peel. Let dough rise again for 5 minutes. Top and transfer to pizza stone. Bake for 10 minutes or until crust is lightly brown and cheese is starting to brown and bubble.

Repeat procedure with second ball of dough.

My notes

1)I use Quick Rise Bread Machine Yeast in order to speed up the rising process. If you use the regular yeast, it usually takes 1-2 hours to rise. With the Quick Rise yeast I usually let it rise for 30-45 minutes, depending on the temperature and humidity.

2)You can play with the amount of white flour to wheat flour ratio. I like to make mine with at least half wheat flour. I like a finer ground wheat flour. It makes for a fluffier crust. Trader Joe's wheat four works well. I've also ground my own wheat to a very fine flour and that works well too. You can also make this recipe using just white flour.

3)For an herbier crust, you can mix dried or fresh herbs right into the dough.

I hope this recipe is written clear enough. If you have questions, let me know.

Summer Squash, Goat Cheese, and Walnut Pizza

INGREDIENTS
1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil, plus more for drizzling
1 garlic clove, minced
All-purpose flour, for dusting
6 ounces pizza dough
Pinch of crushed red pepper
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
1/2 small onion, thinly sliced
1/4 cup shredded part-skim-milk mozzarella
1 teaspoon chopped summer savory
1/4 pound summer squash, thinly sliced on a mandoline
2 ounces fresh goat cheese, crumbled
2 tablespoons chopped toasted walnuts


DIRECTIONS
Preheat the oven to 500°. Preheat a pizza stone. In a small bowl, combine the 1 tablespoon of olive oil with the minced garlic and let stand. On a lightly floured work surface, roll out the dough to form a 12-inch round, 1/4 inch thick. Transfer the round to a lightly floured pizza peel.
Leaving a 1/2-inch border of dough, brush the round with the garlic oil and sprinkle with crushed red pepper, salt and black pepper. Scatter the onion slices over the round; top with the mozzarella and savory. Arrange the squash slices on top in a single layer, overlapping them slightly. Dot with the crumbled goat cheese.
Slide the pizza onto the hot stone and bake for about 5 minutes, until the bottom is crisp and the squash is slightly browned. Transfer the pizza to a work surface. Sprinkle with the walnuts and drizzle with olive oil. Cut into wedges and serve.

*This recipe is from Food and Wine Magazine

My Notes

I make my own whole wheat pizza dough. I'll post that recipe next. I divided my pizza dough in half and made 2 pizzas. I split this recipe's toppings between the two pizzas and it turned out great. As for the toppings themselves, I used dried savory and used about and 1/8 tsp. per pizza. I do not own a mandoline, so I just sliced the squash thinly. And the goat cheese I bought from Trader Joe's was coated in herbs and ended up tasting incredible with the pizza. I'm sure that just plain goat cheese would be fine, but I think I'll make a point to buy the herbed stuff again.