I often make pizza from scratch, it is a great way of using up various bits and pieces I have lying around. Over the years I have tried various recipes for the base, but this is my favorite (and also the easiest). I am particularly proud of this effort because a lot of the ingredients came from my garden.
Ingredients:
Base
- 1 Cup Flour
- Goodly splash of olive oil
- Cold Water
- teaspoon of salt
- 1/2 teaspoon Baking Powder
Toppings
Whatever you can find in the fridge/garden, in this case:
- Tomato paste
- 3 baby leeks chopped
- 2 cloves of Garlic, finely chopped
- 2 small Tomatoes, very thinly sliced
- Red Pepper, sliced
- Mozzarella Cheese, sliced
- Basil Leaves
- Salt/Pepper
- Olive Oil
Method
Put flour, salt, and baking powder in a bowl and pour in the oil (about 2-3 table spoons, maybe more). Pour in a little water and mix. If the flour is still dry, tip just a little more water in but go slowly - it is easy to make it too wet. You want a soft dough, not a cake mix. If you go too far put in some more flour.
Take the dough out and kneed it for a few minutes to complete the mixing, then wrap the dough ball in plastic wrap and let it sit for 30 minutes on the bench.
Put your heaviest (the heavier the better) cooking tray in the oven and heat to 220°C.
Take out the dough and kneed again then divide into 2 or 3 hunks. Roll out each hunk into a roughly circular shape a few millimeters thick. Put the bases on the hot cooking tray and add toppings.
Smear the top of the base with tomato paste, like you were spreading jam on toast. Next put the chopped garlic and leeks (normally I would use onion, but I just happened to have leeks). Slice the tomatoes as thinly as you can and add them along with the basil leaves. Finally slice the mozzarella and put that on top as well - it doesn't have to cover everything.
Don't try to heap too much on the pizza - it needs to cook quickly to get crispy.
Salt and pepper to taste and drizzle on a decent amount of olive oil. Put back in the hot oven and cook until it looks like a pizza. Serve with wine, salad, another pizza.