I like to make pizza at home. In my head I envision myself tossing the dough into the air as it turns in a perfect circle just like on tv. I add toppings and slide it into the oven only to discover the most wonderful pizza ever made 12-15 minutes later.
Well...in real life it goes a little something like this:
First, it I can't get the dough out of the package.
I toss the dough into the air without much gusto and it flops back down into my hands as my fingers tear holes in it. I stretch and stretch the dough in an attempt to make it less than 1 inch thick but the dough just shrinks back into a wrinkly mess.
While my new pizza stone (oven safe only up to 446 degrees F even though everyone knows you cook pizza at 450) is heating up, I finally get the dough into a pizza-like shape on my new pizza peel. I add my toppings and I am ready to go.
The oven beeps and just like in the movies, I am about to slide my pizza from peel to stone. I give my pizza a shake and the dough holds fast to the peel but ALL of the loose mozzarella slides onto the pizza stone and the bottom of the oven.
I grab the spatula to get the pizza onto the stone but it is stuck...super stuck. After many minutes I manage to pull the pizza from the peel and slide it onto a cookie sheet which I then put on top of the pizza stone to bake.
Pizza peel - 1
Amy - 0
I demand a rematch! I don't like to lose...especially to inanimate objects!
But all is well that ends well because it was delicious.
Okay, Amy, looks yummy but try this....
ReplyDeleteTrader Joe's dough is great, $1.29. Comes in white, whole wheat or herb. Whole Foods is also good, but a LOT more expensive. Heck, Market Basket's is good too - $.99!, but just white.
The trick, I think, is to leave the dough in your fridge for days...at least 3...till it is so swollen it looks like it will take over the whole fridge! We had one that actually burst thru' it's plastic sac!
Put a bit of olive oil on your hands, take the dough out of the bag, press down (be gentle!), till the gas has escaped and you have a nice round. Place the dough in an oiled bowl, cover bowl with plastic wrap and leave in a warm place for a couple hours. You will find the dough will be much easier to work with.
Buy some corn meal (comes in a round canister like oatmeal) for your peel. The pizza will slide right off into the oven.
Sometimes we just divide the dough in two, slightly stretch into a round, then plop into oiled 9" round cake pans. Press out to the shape of the pan leaving a nice thick crust around the edge. Eventually it will keep the shape of the pan and stop shrinking back into a blob.
It is easier to handle 2 smaller pizzas than 1 large. You can put different toppings on them (I like spinach, Bob doesn't/he likes hot peppers, I don't!), or you can freeze 1 for later.
Happy pizza making!