Trying the Bon Appetit Grandma Style dough recipe again with more modifications. Minor modifications.
My (personal) problem with Pizza #3 was the crispiness of the crust. To test my recommendation from Pizza #3, we fully preheated the oven to 450F and cooked the pizza for 15 minutes. I failed to mention that the pizza needs to be cooked on the bottom rack. Although we did this for Pizza #3, we forgot this step for Pizza #4. Oops. To redeem brownie points, we added more sugar to the dough and it poofed up nicely. Is this cheating? I was always under the impression yeast needs fuel to activate. I hope it isn’t similar to giving it steroids. Buffed yeast.
The pizza was perfect and exactly the way I would prefer it. Of course my husband insists the last crust was the one of his dreams, and consequently, this one was undercooked. To each his own. It wasn’t soggy, but it had a lightly colored bottom and a softness that matched the chewiness of the cheese. My quest for the perfect dough has been satisfied.
My half of the pizza consisted of 3 cheeses, ground beef cooked with 1 clove of garlic, chopped dehydrated onions, Julian-cut sun-dried tomatoes, blanched spinach, and of course homemade pizza sauce. For the spinach not to burn in the oven it is important it goes on a little wet.
The other half was divided in half again, resulting in 1 quarters of the pizza. Cheeseburger pizza again on a fourth of the entire pizza (as our consistent variable with the modifications), and peanut butter chicken on the other half. The whole pizza then had sun-dried tomatoes, sauce, and 3 cheeses.
Take-Home Tips: For the crust – not everyone will enjoy the softer crust. My recommendation if you like something in the middle of Pizza #3 and #4 would be to set the oven at 475F, cook the dough alone for 5-7 minutes, then add the toppings and proceed with another 15-minutes cook time.
Scoring: 10 of 10. Well maybe you might say 9 of 10. Every time I took the first bite of a slice, whether as left overs or fresh out of the oven, I was completely satisfied and wanted nothing more. If you want a crispier crust, take Pizza #3’s crust with these toppings and say 10 of 10!
Food of the Month 