Mushroom/Tomato Goat Cheese Pizza and a dough recipe

I love pizza! 
Here’s a funny little stat… I make @8 pizzas every two weeks.  I always use a fresh baked from scratch dough.  That sounds like a lot, and it sounds like a lot of work, but nope.
Easy as pie (pizza pie) to make your own dough.  I actually use a modified flatbread recipe (it has a small amount of yeast, but no rising time) for my dough.  I make it in a large batch, divide the batch into 4ths.  That is the perfect size to make 2 personal size pizzas.  One with my wife’s favorite toppings and one with the better toppings for me.
Once I have the dough, I store the divides in separate ziplock bags in the fridge.  If I don’t plan to make the za’s within the two weeks, these freeze just fine.  With the aid of my kitchenaid, it takes 15 minutes to make the dough; just a little longer back when I kneaded everything by hand.  That’s a small investment in time for 8 pizzas.
This was my lunch yesterday…
Leftover Mushrooms sliced, 
Leftover Tomatoes, 
Leftover Goat Cheese 
A sprinkling of Balsamic Vinegar
and a sprinkling of my “Not your grandmother’s Herbes de Provence” spicemix!
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If you are a novice bread maker, this pizza dough recipe is about as easy as it gets.  Just enough yeast to make the insides of the crust sweet and soft.  But crisps up nicely on the outside.  The dough goes right from the kneading process to the fridge.  So, there is no rise time to complicate the process.

The flour and water used in the mix should be as cold as possible.  That’s what allows the yeast to flavor the bread, but keeps the flatbread… flat. 

But I digress away from the recipe…

4 1/2 cups chilled Flour
1 3/4 teaspoon Salt
1 tsp instant Yeast
1/4 cup Olive Oil
1 3/4 cups COLD Water (40 degrees)

OK, did you read the 2 cold ingredients. Takes an extra hour or two of planning, I measure the water and the flour and pop them in the fridge for a couple hours to get cold. The small amount of yeast, relative to the amount of flour and the cold will make for a flat bread, almost no fermentation (rise). Just enough to soften the taste, but not make a big rise. In my pre Kitchenaid days, I mixed and kneaded this recipe in a gallon size ziplock bag. Worked great, largely I believe because of the oil in the recipe. Without that, the dough would be too sticky to mix in a bag. But this sure made clean up easy.

Here’s what I did…

  • Mix the dry ingredients first
  • add the water and oil about a fourth of each at a time
  • mix well until all the flour is hydrated and you form a large dough ball in your bag 
  • continue kneading for about 10 minutes, or if you use your kitchenaid, use the dough hook attachment, and allow the machine to knead for 7 minutes
  • And now, time to divide… Generously sprinkle a work surface with flour. Also, prepare 4 ziplock sandwich size bags (bigger works fine as well) by spraying the insides of them with spray canola oil.
  • Plop the dough ball into the flour and coat well. Divide into 4 equal parts (or fewer if you know you are making larger pizzas). Put each dough ball into a prepared ziplock bag and refrigerate at least 6 hours, and preferably overnight. When it comes cooking time, allow the dough to reach room temp.

When it comes cooking time, allow the dough to reach room temp.
If you are making one big one, just roll out round and flat (actually, any shape you like).  Add your toppings and bake in a preheated 500 degree oven for 10-12 minutes.
Not a bad lunch!
Dave here from MY YEAR ON THE GRILL. It really is just this easy!  

 … I CAN COOK THAT! 

And so can you!

8 Comments

tahtimbo

I’ll have to try this recipe tomorrow. I like the idea that I can make four crusts and have them stored in the fridge until I need them.
This gives me a great excuse to have pizza more often 🙂

jsimplylive

Pizza…yum! I am a HUGE fan of pizza and try them with just about anything, except sweets…sorry that is where I draw the line. But yours has goat cheese! I LOVE GOAT CHEESE more than any cheese in the world, so thank you for sharing this recipe.

Martha (MM)

Great looking pizza Dave! I agree with you on making your own pizza dough. I’m not much of a baker but I do keep the bread machine going most Saturdays making fresh bread and pizza dough. Pizza is one of the most fun ways to use up leftovers 🙂

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