Deep Dish Pizza in Cast Iron

I know a lot of people aren't fans of the "Pan" type pizza, usually because it has someting to do with the thick crust. But I love it. I used a recipe I have used before, with the only changes being the white cornmeal instead of yellow, and I used the cheese I had on hand, which was mozzarella and smoked gouda. I topped mine with pepperoni, onions and mushrooms, and Chad's with Just pepperoni.

I think I do prefer the yellow cornmeal to the white, but tonight, Chad said he liked this one better. Go figure. Anyway, this is another inexpensive meal to make as you can add whatever leftover meat, veggies, cheeses you have on hand, And yes, it can be done on a week night. If you prefer to make the dough ahead of time, just store it in the fridge for up to 3 days, or freeze. **I pre-baked the crust 5 minutes before topping, it lent to a crispier crust***

Daring Bakers Challenge: Pizza!

For this month's challenge we were to make "Pizza Napoletana” from Peter Reinhart's “The Bread Baker's Apprentice". Our host this month was Rosa of "Rosa's Yummy Yums".

Now I've made pizza before, so I wasn't really intimidated. But the recipe was a bit different than how I usually make it. Not a hard recipe to follow, but just different. I usually make the dough and bake it the same day, but this recipe had it rest in the fridge overnight. I was really excited to use my new KA mixer to help me, it was a bit easier than working the dough by hand (minus the kneading). Oh, and we needed to capture us throwing the pizza like a real Pizziola. This is me (not a great pic, but it worked just fine!)

Here are my balls (lol) ready to refrigerate

I have to say, this was a great recipe! I cut it into 6 pieces, and used two tonight for our dinner, and plan to use the rest later, per the freezing instructions.

I made Chad's ( homemade pizza sauce, mozzarella, turkey pepperoni, and parsley)

And mine (tomato sauce, feta, black olive, parsley and fresh grape tomatoes)

The crust was so crispy and flavorful, the perfect consistency.

Just look at that yummy-ness!

Big thanks go out to Rosa for a great challenge.

For the recipe including Gluten Free instructions visit Rosa's blog.

****I dedicate this post to Sherry, your fervor for baking still inspires.****

Healthy Pizza and a Product Rave

Tonight on his way home from work Chad mentioned (complained) that he really wanted pizza. I feel bad for him. I mean, he just lost 30 lbs. and he is doing WW with me. Mainly because I'm the cook in the house, although he wants to eat healthier. Since I didn't lose any weight last week (boo hoo) I really wanted to stick to my points. Which meant no pizza.... Unless you make it healthy, which is what I did thanks to this wonderful new find:

They are only worth 1 WW point, and make a wonderful crust for a pizza. I baked mine in a 350 oven for about 7 minutes first, then topped with my favorite toppings and enjoyed it immensly.
My ingredients were:
1/3 C. pizza sauce
1/2 cup FF mozzarella cheese
fresh basil (from a wonderful coworker who says it is growing out of control. I'm happy to take it off her hands)
fresh oregano (Again, from my coworker. Love how generous she is!)
1/4 C. portabello mushrooms
1 Tbs. chopped onion
5 slices turkey pepperoni (I like to slice mine to sprinkle evenly over the crust. That make me get a little bit of pepperoni in every bite ; )


After I topped it I put it back in the oven for the cheese to melt. How awesome is it when you can have pizza for only 4 points? And the serving is just right too!
Chad likes to stick to the basics when it comes to pizza, his was topped with just the pepperoni and cheese. I'm happy he was actually able to eat what he has been craving. And I'm happy I did too.

Deep Dish Pizza

Today was a very easy day for me. It was a teacher workday, which means no students, and we got to leave at noon. Fortunately, I had all my grades finished and I was planned for the next couple of weeks. So when I got to work I watched CNN for a bit and nested. I wasn't sure if I was going to cook tonight or not because Chad went out of town and wasn't due home until about 9. After taking an early afternoon nap, I started thinking about dinner. I knew that I didn't want to order out, and I wasn't up to going out either. So I started thinking about easy dinner recipes.

Friday nights used to be Pizza night when I was in high school, and because Chad loves pizza that was what I decided to make. I had no frozen Trader Joe's pizza dough, so that meant I needed to and make my own. I've made pizza dough many times before, but I was feeling adventureous and wanted to do something a bit different. I decided to to try my hand at deep dish pizza. I love Chicago style pizza, so this was a challenge and I was excited to take it on. I already Had some homemade marinara in the freezer form a previous meal so no worries about making the sauce. I did add a 1/2 cup of canned diced tomatoes to make the sauce a bit chunkier.

I'm happy to report that the pizza was delicious. My first deep dish, I'm so proud!

Deep Dish Pizza Dough

• 1 package active dry yeast
• 1 cup warm water
• 2 1/2 cups ap flour sifted
• 1/2 Cup yellow corn meal
• 1 1/2 tsp. sugar
• 1 tsp. salt
• 3 Tbs. plus 2 more olive oil (use other 2 for bowl)

Put water in a big glass bowl and add yeast and mix together. Let sit for a couple of minutes until it starts to have tiny bubbles. Add flour, salt, sugar slowly stirring with a wooden spoon. when it gets to a less sticky consistency start mixing with your hands (remember to take off your rings!). Add cornmeal and olive oil and mix together until all ingredients are combined. Transfer to a lightly floured counter and knead until dough is smooth. Form dough into a ball, lightly oil a glass bowl with the remaining olive oil, and put the ball of dough in. Cover with plastic wrap and let rise to Double its size, this will take about an hour.

Toppings:

• 2 cups mozzarella cheese shredded
• 1/2 cup havarti sliced thin
• 1/2 cup freshly grated parmesan cheese
• 1 Tbs. dried oregano
• pepperoni slices (as many as you wish)
• 1 1/4 (this is an estimate) marinara sauce with diced tomatoes.
• 2 Tbs. large diced yellow onion
• 2 Tbs. fresh chopped flat leaf parsley
• 1 tsp. red pepper flakes

Assembly:

Grease your cast iron skillet and preheat oven to 450 degrees. Roll dough into a rectangle and using hands make the closest to a circle with the dough as you can using your fists ( Do this off the counter, let gravity do its job). Transfer dough to a large cast iron skillet (I used a 12 "). Spread dough around the skillet and up the sides. Make it as even as possible. Let sit about 10-15 minutes so it can rise a bit. When the dough has risen, add 1 cup of the mozzarella. Top with 1 cup of the mozzarella then with the marinara and red pepper flakes and spread spread evenly with a spoon or spatula. Add pepperoni and then top with the remaining cheese and parsley. Cook on bottom rack for 15 minutes, then transfer to the top rack for about 5-10 minutes so the cheese gets nice and bubbly brown.

Let pizza rest about 10 minutes and cut into slices with a pizza cutter. Eat with a fork and a knife.

Make Your Own Pizza

Tonight was make your own pizza night. I bought the garlic and herb pizza dough from Trader Joe a couple weeks ago and put it in the freezer since we didn't use it. I took it out to thaw Sat. night so it would be ready for tonight. Such an easy and quick dinner for a weeknight.

Because I am the veggie eater in the house, I decided to split the dough in half so Chad and I could put our own ingredients. I topped mine with chopped kalamata olives, sliced grape tomatoes, torn basil leaves, thinly sliced onions, chopped bell pepper, chopped pepperoni, mozzarella and Parmesan.

Chad put pepperoni and Havarti cheese (his favorite). NOtice he chose not to put one single veggie.

For the sauce I just opened a small 8oz. can of tomato sauce and added some garlic powder, onion powder, dried basil, dried oregano, a pinch of sugar and salt and pepper.

I rolled the dough while the oven was preheating to 350 degrees. When I got them to the desired shape (I like thin crust). I pre-baked them for about 6-7 minutes. I took them out sauced, and topped with our desired ingredients.

I also paired mine with a very delicious salad. I ate the entire thing before I even touched my pizza. I chopped some romaine, added grape tomatoes, crumbled gorgonzola, and chopped pecans.I made a raspberry vinaigrette by using a teaspoon of raspberry preserves, a little red wine vinegar, a little olive oil, garlic powder, salt and pepper.