Pizza Three Ways

Pizza. Need I say more? I recently discovered that Eric’s older brother had a recipe for a deep dish crust and the idea sort of snowballed from there. We ended up with three pizzas and two very full bellies.

The deep dish was Eric’s endeavor for the night. He broke the pinky finger on his right hand a couple weeks ago, and since he’s right-handed it’s turned him into a bit of a gimp. I say that with love, people. So I agreed to be his sous chef. And I lent him an apron. Isn’t he pretty?

The deep dish crust has beer and cornmeal in it and, like most dough, has to proof for a couple hours. It was at this moment that we made an amazing discovery- my warming drawer has a proofer setting! Incredible. You might start seeing a lot more homemade bread being made from here on out. We mixed the dough with the bread hook in my stand mixer and it practically killed the poor thing. I had to hold the bowl securely onto the stand for the last few minutes. Oh well. It was worth it.

We layered it like a traditional Chicago deep dish: cheese, meat, sauce. Mmm, sausagey.

Eric threw together a homemade pizza sauce, which, for some reason, is really easy for him to do. I guess that’s what being 25% more Italian than me does for you.

Ready for the oven. Hooray! 30 minutes(ish) later you’ve got yourself a feast.

I think next time we’ll probably foil the top and bake for about 15 minutes, then remove the foil and finish it off. Only because the cheese wasn’t as gooey as we wanted it in the middle. But for our first attempt at homemade deep dish I’d say it was pretty damn good. But you can’t just have deep dish, right? You need a pizza appetizer. Just go with me on this one.

I found a recipe for thin crust dough that turned out to be really delicious- great flavor. And it’s no-proof, which makes it extremely convenient.

All you have to do is let it rest for about ten minutes after the mixing and kneading, then you can stretch it out into your pans.

I chose the toppings for one and Eric chose the toppings for the other. On mine I brushed the crust with olive oil, sprinkled some fresh rosemary and sea salt, then laid down a liberal coating of goat cheese. I topped it with Mission figs and prosciutto and voila!

The figs make for a really nice sweet contrast to the salty prosciutto, and the goat cheese adds a really nice tangy flavor.

Don’t be timid with the prosciutto. It’ll shrink up a lot in the oven.

See what I mean? I really liked the way this one came out, but after trying some straight from the fridge the next day I realized something: this pizza is actually better cold. Funny, eh?

Eric topped his pizza with beurre blanc sauce as a base (because apparently, “You have to have some kind of sauce!”). Then he sprinkled some crispy bacon bits and caramelized red onions and topped it off with shredded gruyere and fontina cheese.

Those onions were awesome. Red onions, sugar, butter, red wine… I think. He’s a sneaky chef. I never know what he’s doing in there.

I did pick out the cheeses. Because, hey, I know my cheese.

Crispy brown and delicious. And better warm than cold. I think the only thing we would’ve done differently with the thin crusts is to par-bake them for maybe 5-7 minutes, then take them out, top them and put them back in to finish them off. Just to get the crust a little crispier in the middle.

I highly recommend making your own homemade pizzas. It’s a lot of fun and it would definitely be a fun way to cook with kids. My sister is about to have her first baby, so I figure I should start becoming more aware of kid-friendly projects. Hopefully next week I’ll not only have another tasty post, but a brand new niece as well!

Have a great weekend everyone!