Homemade pizza is a regular, if not weekly, menu item at my house.
And when I say homemade, I really do mean homemade.
From the crust and the sauce to the unique combination of toppings, my husband, Joe, and I create each element ourselves.
Or we did until we found ready-to-bake pizza crust, two per package, imported from Italy in the freezer section at one of the many grocery stores we frequent.
The crusts were perfect.
Crisp on the bottom, yet chewy and flavorful. But much to our disappointment, the market stopped carrying the crusts (the shelf space is now devoted to pizza pies with the store’s founder’s name on them).
The problem with homemade pizza crust is that for a really good crust, pizza can’t be a spur-of-the-moment dinner idea. Good crust takes time. Hours and hours, in fact.
But I wasn’t willing to go back to the preservative-filled, cardboard-and yeast-flavored plastic-wrapped ready-made crusts.
So I set out to make pizza dough I could shape, partially bake and freeze to have on hand whenever pizza mood struck.
Around the same time, I received a review copy of The Italian Cooking Course by Katie Caldesi. The book, a re-release of Caldesi’s 2009 book Cook Italy (both published by Kyle Books), includes several recipes for pizza and pizza crust.
Knowing that even bad homemade pizza crust is often better than those plastic wrapped crusts available in the grocery store, I decided to give one of Caldesi’s recipes a try.
The recipe made enough dough for four crusts and, though it doesn’t require it, the dough greatly benefits from a long, slow rise. This is best achieved by placing the dough in the refrigerator the night before you plan to use it.
The dough, fresh and frozen, made delicious pizzas.
So now we’ve got our own stash of frozen pizza dough in the freezer. It may not be imported all the way from Italy, but it’s just as tasty.
24-Hour Pizza Crust 1 ( ¼ -ounce) envelope instant
dry yeast 1◊cups lukewarm water 2 tablespoons olive oil, plus
more for coating 5 cups bread flour OR
all-purpose flour OR a
combination 2 teaspoons salt Cornmeal, for dusting In a mixing bowl, or the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a dough hook, combine the yeast and warm water. Add the olive oil, flour and salt and stir with a wooden spoon or with the mixer on low speed until mixture forms a dough.
Knead 8 to 10 minutes or until dough is smooth and elastic.
Transfer dough to a lightly oiled bowl, cover with plastic wrap or a clean towel. If time allows, refrigerate 18 to 24 hours.
If not, leave dough at room temperature and let rise until doubled in size.
Divide dough into 4 equal portions and let rise until doubled in size again.
Heat oven to its hottest setting (475 to 550 degrees is ideal). Place a pizza stone or an upside down baking sheet in the oven as it heats.
Sprinkle the work surface with cornmeal. Roll each portion of dough into an 8- to 10-inch circle. One at a time, transfer each dough circle to the heated pizza stone (use a baker’s peel or upside down cookie sheet) and bake 3 to 5 minutes.
At this point the crusts can be topped and baked as desired, or let them cool completely, wrap well in plastic and then foil, and freeze until ready to use.
Makes 4 pizza crusts.
Food, Pages 29 on 05/29/2013