The Pizza

Intro: Brian Teeman, Chefs: Luca Marzo & Giovanni

Dough preparation

To bake a real italian homemade pizza you would need the following ingredients:

• 500 g of flour (00 soft wheat flour)
• 1 tablespoon of extra-virgin olive oil
• 1 tablespoon of fine salt
• 1 teaspoon of sugar
• 1 fresh brewer's yeast
• 1 glass of water

You would also need a weight scale, a large bowl, a glass and a small pot.

Let's start the preparation of the dough.

Take a bowl and put into that 500g of flour 00.
Add 1 tablespoon of extra-virgin olive oil and a tablespoon of fine salt.

Take a small pot and heat a glass of water, when the water is lukewarm, add the fresh brewer's yeast, then add a teaspoon of sugar and help them melt.
Once the yeast is completely melted, add it to the bowl and begin to knead with your hands.
You have to knead the ingredients until you obtain a soft and compact dough.
While you knead, you might need to add water or flour to achieve the desired consistency.

Once you get a soft and compact dough, add some flour on top of it and make a cross-shaped cut with a knife.

Your dough is ready, just close the bowl and put a dish cloth on it.
Put the bowl in a warm environment and leave the dough rest for at least 2 hours.
The longer it rests, the better would be the pizza.
You can also prepare the dough 1 day before to have a softer and more digestible pizza.

Pizza preparation

Now that the dough is ready, we can finally prepare our pizza.
Here comes the fun and you can unleash your creativity for the topping.
If you want to stay “conservative” and have a margherita, just follow the instructions below.

To prepare a pizza margherita you would need the following ingredients:

• A cup of tomato sauce
• 125 g of mozzarella cheese
• A bit of olive oil
• A pinch of fine salt
• A pinch of oregano, if you like it on top.

Let’s start sprinkling the baking dish with some olive oil. To regulate the quantity of oil, just use a piece of kitchen paper. The oil will help prevent pizza from sticking to the pan.

Once our baking dish is ready, let’s prepare the topping.
Take a cup and put in it some tomato sauce, a pinch of fine salt and a bit of olive oil. I like a lot oregano, so I usually add some oregano in the sauce too. Let’s use a tablespoon to mix the ingredients. And the sauce is ready.

Now let’s prepare the mozzarella cheese. Take a mozzarella cheese of your choice, today we’re going to use a 125g one, and cut it into small pieces. You don’t need to be precise, the smaller you cut the mozzarella, the easier would be to spread it on the whole pizza. It’s ready.

Meanwhile let’s switch on the oven. We’re going to use the pizza program in the oven. If your oven doesn’t have a pizza program, just set it at the highest temperature, both sides and with the fan on. If you have a static oven, just set it at the highest temperature, only the bottom cooking side.

It’s time to take our dough that rested enough and multiplied its volume.
We’re going to use a chopping/baking board, but if you don’t have it, clean your table (without soap) and use it. Put the dough on the board and use a wooden rolling pin to roll out the dough.

Here we like a thin pizza, so just press with the rolling pin until you have the desired thickness.

Put the rolled dough in the baking dish. From now on you can unleash your creativity.

For the margherita, take the sauce we prepared earlier and spread it over the dough to cover the entire surface. Now let’s spread mozzarella cheese over the pizza base. You can choose the quantity of mozzarella you want to have.
Usually I finish the pizza with an oregano splash.

While we prepared the pizza, the oven reached the desired temperature, it’s time to put the pizza in the oven. The cooking time depends on the type of oven you’re going to use, but you can definitely understand when it’s ready, just looking at the cheese / topping that is melted and cooked.

Our pizza is finally ready to eat! Just cut into slices and enjoy it with your friends, while squashing Joomla bugs!