Prep time to eat time: 2 hours
Feeds 4 to 8 adults.

So the kids and I were back at it again, but this time we made what *I* wanted to make for FamilyTestKitchen.com: PIZZA!

We'll be making two 16" pies with this recipe. I make my pizza on 16" pizza screens. They are available at restaurant supply stores and online for about $5 (and well worth it). Because they let heat pass through, you can cook your pizza by taking advantage of the full convection of your home oven. Heated air from the top AND bottom. Pizza stones are great too, but with a screen you don't have to worry about uneven cooking even when your pizza isn't (uneven).

This recipe has very few ingredients, steps that are easily mastered, and a lot of taste. The key is the dough. I compare making dough to babysitting. From the moment you start the recipe, pay attention to every step, their timing, and how well you feed your yeast. Master the dough and you've mastered practically any recipe for bread products.

So let's get started... 

Ingredients:

Dough:

• 6 cups of bread flour (high gluten / winter wheat)
• 4 teasoons of yeast
• 4 teaspoons of sugar
• 4 teaspoons of olive oil
• 1/2 teaspoon of salt
• 2-1/2 cups of water
• 1 cup of finely ground corn meal

Pizza toppings:

• Sauce: any canned PLAIN "spaghetti" sauce will do. When it comes right down to it, it's pretty darned close to pizza sauce. If you want to get fancy and make sauce from scratch, get a large can (15 oz) of plain tomato sauce, a small can of tomato paste (5 oz), and season to taste. Don't cook it or heat it up! That was alrady done before it was put in the can. You'll have enough for two pizzas. Roughly, each 16" pizza needs around 8 fl oz of sauce.
  
• Cheese: I get my mozarella cheese in 5lb blocks. It's much less expensive that way *AND* you can cut it up and freeze it for later use. You'll need about 2 cups of shredded cheese for each pie, which is just over a pound. Naturally, you can use more, or less, to taste.
• Pepperoni: Again, I buy in bulk, 5lb (or more) bags. One 5lb bag is about $13, which is great!  You'll need about 60 pepperoni slices for a one-topping pepperoni pie (less than a pound)
  
• The rest: Any lessor toppings I get at the local grocery store.  You can add more or less to taste, but see my notes at the end of this article for adding multiple toppings and how it affects the bake.
  

In the following instructions, you'll see a lot of detail.  Please do read through them to understand the "why's" of the technique.  However, as they say, a picture is worth a thousand words, and moving pictures must be worth millions, right?  So, we've recorded the process so that you can SEE how to make pizza.  The first video, below, is preparing the dough.  The second, is making your edge and finishing the pie.  As you read the notes, you can reference the video for demonstration.  This is specially useful in making your edge.

Getting started:

Combine your yeast, sugar, and 2 cups of your water, heated to 120-degrees, in a 1 quart bowl. Don't get the water too hot. It will kill the yeast. Whisk ingredients together thoroughly. Set aside for 10-15 minutes out of any drafts. You're making a "sponge" where the yeast rises within the water, eating the sugar. This gives the yeast a brilliant head-start and makes your dough more even.

While you're waiting for your "sponge" to rise, pour the flour and salt in your mixer (I use KitchenAid because they're durable, STRONG, and look great). Use the dough hook or blade. When the "sponge is risen about a half-inch, pour it into the mixing bowl, and turn on your mixer to the lowest setting. Slowly add your olive oil as the dough mixes. After about 4 minutes, you may notice that that some of the flour isn't mixing at the bottom of the bowl. Stop the mixer, move the dough ball over with a spatula, then pour in the remaining 1/2 cup of water. Turn the mixer back on for another 5 minutes, or until the dough appears smooth, but dry, as it rolls. If you notice that the dough still looks slightly wet or sticky, ad a few tablespoons of flour at a time, until you see the consistany you want.

Next, take two 2-1/2 quart bowls and spray the inside with non-stick cooking spray, or coat with olive oil. When the dough has finished mixing, divide the dough ball into two equal halves, and form two new round dough balls, placing one in each bowl. Coat the tops of each with your cooking spray, or oil, and cover with plastic wrap. Set aside at room-temperature, away from drafts, for about an hour, or until the dough balls have doubled in size.

So with your hour to kill, have a beer, glass of wine, can of soda, or a cup of juice, and dream of the pizza you'll be eating in about an hour and a half.

After your dough has risen, preheat your oven to 500 F, then clear your dough working surface for the span of a 16" piece of dough. The kitchen countertop is great for this.  If you have a marble or poured/shaped concrete countertop, EVEN BETTER!  Have you ever noticed that pizza restaurants have huge stainless steel or marble tables to work their dough?  You want your working surface to be chilled so the dough is workable. Marble, stone, concrete, and steel are best, but a standard veneer countertop will work just fine for an occassional homemade pie.

Pour your corn meal in the middle of it in about an 10" circle. Uncover the first dough ball. DON'T lift it out with your hands. Turn the bowl upside down and flop it onto the corn meal. It will relax and give up some of it's air (don't laugh, but this is called "burping the dough").

To watch the steps of the dough stretch right though to the finished pie, just click the "play" button, below:

Holding your Hands Correctly

This next part can either make, or break, the shaping of your crust. Be cautious. The last things you want are thin spots, or putting your fingers though the dough. You have to hold your hands right to get your crust's edge right.

The Method:

1. Put your hands together in the "praying position"; palms together with your fingers against eachother (non-intertwined).
2. Now, picturing a hinge running down your forefingers (pointers) to the first joint of your thumbs, open your palms facing down. Cross your thumbs over eachother, and forefingers (pointers) just slighly overlapping so that you middle fingers are one over eachother, fingerprint to fingernail.

This puts your hands in a position so if you push down with your fingers, it will keep your palms raised off the working surface. Right there's the magic. For making a good edge, the only pressure point should be the tips of your fingers.

The Edge:

1. With your hands still in position from the last step, touch your fingers to the far side of the dough (furthest away from you) about 1/2" in from the edge
2. Push down with your finger tips with enough pressure to flatten, but not push through, the dough where your fingertips are touching.
3. With your fingers still on the dough, turn the dough ball one notch clockwise (about 10 minutes on the clock).
4. Repeat this process until you have an edge all the way around the doughball. It should resemble a patty-pan squash, or a flattened "skull cap" hat. Higher and round in the middle with a rounded edge.
   

The Stretch:

Although it looks cool, throwing pizza dough around is something that most people don't master quite easily, and it tends to stretch the dough too thin if you're not one that does it every day. We'll stretch our dough on the counter. It's much easier for most people.

With your hands still in the "fanned" position, unlock your thumbs, and lay all of your fingertips, side by side, along the far side of your dough, just inside of the channel you made in the last step. Your hands will be in the 11 o'clock and 1 o'clock positions.

Use your left hand to "anchor" the dough and keep it stationary. The line of pressure from your left hand should run from the tip in your little finger along the outside of your palm. Your left hand should be nearly flat, but not all the way, so you can feel the dough get thinner under your left hand as you stretch it away with your right hand. Lay your right hand on the dough, finger tips just inside the edge, and with the pressure of your fingers up to the point of your palm (but not your palm), carefully stretch the dough by moving your right hand away from your left. Don't go to far, or too fast, or you'll tear the dough. Only stretch slightly at first.

When you reach the end of each stretching motion, re-position your right hand one notch counterclockwise, and repeat the last step. Go around the entire dough enough times to get the dough to ALMOST the size of the screen you'll use for baking. I call this part "driving the car" because it looks like you're turning a steering wheel.

Placement of the Dough on the Screen:

With your dough stretched almost to size, slide your hands, palms down, under the dough and gently lift it, moving your hands around the outside of the dough as it hangs from your hands. This shakes loose any extra corn meal. DON'T STRETCH IT. Gravity will do that for you. After about once around the dough, lay it down on the screen with the same side down as was down when you stretched it originally. Without pinching your edges too much, straighten up the dough so that it remains round, and just slightly larger than the screen itself (less than 1/2").

Applying your Sauce:

Sauce is one of those things that takes a small amount of practice to apply, but once you've got it, you've got it. Our 16" pizza will take about 8oz of sauce. The absolute easiest way to apply it is with a "spoodle". A spoodle is a flat-bottom ladel with the handle at a 90 degree angle to the bowl. This makes sauce application much easier since it keeps your hand at a more natural angle to the working surface. If you don't have a spoodle, get one! ...but you *can* still use a ladel. You'll need 2 scoops of sauce (8 oz).

Place the sauce in the center of your dough. Set your spoodle in the middle of the sauce pile, and let it rest on the center, without pushing down too hard. The downward pressure you apply should be just enough to leave the thickness of sauce you'll want across the whole pie. Now start to move the spoodle in an outward pinwheel spin, starting with small, tight, circles near the middle, and expanding as you move out to the edges of the pie. Best case scenario, you never have to pass over the same spot more than twice and you get a nice even sauce depth across the whole pizza.

Adding your Toppings:

Adding items to your pizza might sound simple enough, but there's methodology to that too. Different toppings have different properties, and react differently to heat. Because you want everything to be cooked evenly, it matters what order you add toppings. Here are a few sample items, and the order that you would put them atop of your sauce.

1. Spinach and other leafy vegetables. These vegetables give up their water very quickly. By protecting them between the sauce and the cheese, we help them retain their flavor without getting dried out.
   
2. Feta, or other "watery" cheeses.
3. Cheddar Cheese (because if it's on top, it will burn).
   
4. Mozarella cheese.
5. Provolone cheese. TIP: Mix your mozarella and provolone 50/50 for your pizzas. You get a much fuller flavored, and stretchier, cheese topping.
   
6. Meats: ham, suasage, beef, pepperoni, bacon. These meats are already cooked, so adding them directly to the cheese brings out their cooked flavors, melting them into the cheese.
   
7. Watery vegetables: tomatoes, green peppers, onions, mushrooms. These veggies give their water up, but not with a little coaxing, so keeping them near the surface will prevent soggy toppings.

There are many other toppings you could use. Just put them into the category that best fits, and place them on your pizza in that order.

NOTE: After your first topping, for each additional topping you add, cut the portion by 33%. That is, if a pepperoni pizza has 100% topping coverage, and you want to add two more toppings, reduce the amount of those toppings by 33%, each. Not doing so will undercook your pizza toppings, because the bottom of the crust will get done before the top of your pizza. I highly recommend that you do not place more than 5 toppings on a pizza, including any extra cheese, for this very reason.

Baking the Pizza:

Since your oven is already preheated, WITH YOUR FACE AWAY FROM THE OPENING DOOR, open you oven door and place your topped pizza on the center rack. Set your oven timer for 10 minutes, but watch the pie!

Second Pizza:

Now it's time to prepare your second pizza. Repeat the previous dough, sauce and topping steps, then set it aside while you are waiting for the first pie to finish baking.

Finishing Steps:

As the bake on your first pie approaches 8 minutes, look for the crust to turn golden brown, and the cheese to begin to darken. When you're satisfied with the doneness of the bake, remove the pie from the oven, and slide if off the screen onto a large cutting board or newsprint.  Then place the second pie on the center oven rack and set your timer for 10 minutes.  Now you can cut your first pie with your pizza blade, and serve. By the time your second pizza is done, the crowd will be ready for the second pie!

Portion Size:

It goes without saying that to make this recipe for just one pizza, cut the ingredients in half. However, if you prepare the dough as directed for two pizzas, and place one of the two "pre-risen" dough balls in the freezer, you've got dough ready for another day! Just coat the second dough ball with oil, place it in a freezer bag, and freeze for up to a month. When you take it out, let it thaw (covered in a bowl), to rise to double its size (about 3 hours), then prepare it as you would in the previous instructions from, "The Edge", forward.

Mangia bene!