Wednesday, 6 January 2016

Homemade Pizza time.....

I'm really keen to start using up all my food and not to waste any.  If i think of how much i was throwing away, it probably comes to hundreds of pounds a year.  So from now on i will be looking at clever ways to use food up. Tonight was my first attempt.
 We love pizza.  Well me and the kids do.  Mr A not so much because he cannot bear (bare?) cheese.  This can be problematic as i make almost exclusively vegetarian food (I don't like meat).  I figured  he really needs to get with the joys of pizza and decided to make my own dough.  I do like to decide these things on the spur of the moment!
 I used:  1 L of warm water
              4 tbs of granulated sugar (I never have caster in when i need it)
              25g of dry active yeast
              a really good grinding of salt
              nearly 3 1/2 lb of plain flour
              4 oz butter (melted)

I mixed the yeast and sugar with some of the warm water to dilute it and left it to froth up.
I added the reast of the water to 3lb of the flour, salt and butter and mixed like mad.
Then i added in the yeast mixture.  It was super runny and gloopy so i added more flour till it was a soft dough.  I actually ran out of plain flour and ended up using a little self raising! Doughy pizza crust is fine by me.

Next i kneaded till my arms dropped off.  Roughly about ten minutes or so.  By this time it had grown loads (like a big dough monster) so i popped it back in the bowl to rise and left it alone.  I have a little trick to rising dough.  I have one of those wheat bags and it happens to be a long sausage shape.  I get it super hot in the microwave then wrap it round the outside of the bowl.  Keeps the dough nice and warm.  
Apparently the way to tell if your Dough is ready is to press a finger in.  If the indent remains, it's ready. This dough makes enough for 4 pizzas so i cut off what i needed and portioned and froze the rest.

I needed a tomato paste for the base.  I really wanted to use up a slimy old leek i found.  It was pretty grim looking but i peeled off the outer layers and it happened to be perfect inside.  I chopped it up really small, and did the same with a couple of garlic cloves.  Popped them in the wok with water and a can of chopped tomatoes.  I really like Aldi's chopped toms with herbs.  It was really watery so i boiled it up and reduced it to a yummy paste (keep stirring so it doesn't burn).  When it was cool-ish, i blasted it in the blender in to a paste. 
Time to construct the pizza.  Not only does Mr A hate cheese but he wouldn't be able to eat any food 'contaminated' with or touching cheese.  So i had an idea to create a dough barrier down the middle of the pizza.
I then added each persons favourite toppings.  In my case, some mushrooms that needed using, red peppers and cheese, in his case, peppers, a dried chilli chopped really fine and some corned beef.  What i loved was that i could manage the amount i added.  I made the pizza healthier on my side by adding a few cheese slices rather than a whole pile of grated cheese.  Fewer calories but the same cheesy taste. 
The result was delicious!  Oh my word homemade dough tastes amazing! I normally can't stand the crusts on a shop bought pizza but this crust was so delish i ate it dipped in left over tomato sauce.  Divine!  I now have slightly sore wrists but the hard work is done.  For future pizzas I'll just grab some dough ready made from the freezer.








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