This is kinda simplified/bastardised version of SeriousEats's nonna style pizza. It's kinda like pizza hut pan pizza crust. No it's nothing like "real pizza" - whatever, it's cheap and easy for me to make and has saved me a ton of money over the last few months instead of buying pizza.
I have a kitchenaid mixer. They're expensive but awesome. I've had mine for over a decade and use it loads.
This pizza is like... a whole baking sheet... like a normal lipped kind. I dunno I guess I should measure it.
anyway, pizza dough!
500g strong bread flour
2 teaspoons COARSE salt, like maldon salt, if using normal salt, possibly cut back to 1/2 teaspoon
1 teaspoon easy mix yeast (the dry kind you mix with flour, no re-hydration needed. tends to say for breadmakers)
2 Tablespoons oil (I'm lazy i use sunflower oil for everything) - You'll need MORE oil for the pan. LIKE LOTS!
1.5cups (~375ml) warm water. If you have an electric kettle, the easy way of getting yeast-safe perfect temperature water every time is use about 1/3rd boiling water to 2/3rds cold water from the tap. This is magic I've heard allegedly stems from the Romans so go thank them next time you see any in game 😉
So... weigh out your flour in the bowl, chuck in the salt & yeast, give it a quick whisk around with a hand whisk (**** sieving and all that, whisks are great for this). Drizzle in the oil. Pour in your water. Set mixer to mix with dough hook for a few minutes until it comes together then turn it up to medium speed to knead for about 5 minutes. DOUGH IS VERY STICKY. THIS IS GOOD. IT MEANS IT'S FLUFFY 🙂
While that kneads, pour oil into a baking sheet. Lots. of. oil. Rub it around with your fingers, it should be deep enough to leave finger tip marks through the puddle of oil completely covering the bottom of the pan. Think shallow-frying. That's basically the aim of this pizza. Nom.
Using a spoon, scrape the dough onto the heavily oiled baking sheet. Using your greased up hands, flip the dough ball over so it's greased on both sides/all sides and squish it down into a roughly rectangular shape, cover with plastic film and let rise for about an hour or so. It should kinda fill the pan or at least puff up and relax enough you can manipulate it to fill the pan.
Top with sauce, toppings and cheese (cheap pre-grated mozz is good for this trashy pizza). I use my trashy pizza sauce + cheese and maybe some sliced up chorizo (the dried kind not the fresh kind) or BBQ sauce with (precooked) chicken chunks, onions, peppers, chopped bacon is awesome too.
Heat oven to 400F/200C (ish). You may need to experiment a bit with this... I find I need to cook mine on the bottom rack for 10-15minutes then bring it up to the middle rack for the last 5-10 minutes. Sometimes I have to precook the base a little longer before putting on any cheese unless I like all, pretty browned cheese. I've now gotten to a point where I put on half the cheese first... then put on a little more towards the last 5 minutes so you get a mix of gooey just-melted and slightly crisp & brown cheese.
Ultra trashy easy pizza sauce no one should admit to making but should make it anyway
Okay, if the above wasn't enough to set off pizza wars, this will be.
My pizza sauce is:
- Tomato paste/puree - it comes in a tube here. I use about a third of a tube in a bowl per big pizza
- Dried Onion granules/powder whatever
- Dried Garlic granules/powder whatever
- Dried Basil
- Dried Oregano
- Salt & Pepper to taste
- Water to thin
- Optional, a little oil keeps it from drying out so bad.
So, um, I squeeze out a bunch of tomato goop into a bowl, heavily sprinkle with dried onion and dried garlic. Sprinkle on tons of dried basil and dried oregano, roughly keeping the ratio of 1 part basil to 2 parts oregano. Maybe a bit of salt (but the dough is pretty salty, ditto cheese etc) and some ground pepper and maybe some oil. Mix up with some water to thin it out to a thick paste. Done. Honestly, why try cooking down loads of tomatoes into a sauce that's going to make your pizza soggy? Okay I'm going to run away now before I get pelted with rotten tomatoes...
~Akki