Pizza Dough Recipes , Tips and Quick Questions

tim_n

On several occasions I've wanted the taste of my old homemade pizzas - when I was a student I had plenty of time to make some really delicious bases and my hm pizza and hm beer parties were an event admired by all (especially since I used to dumpster dive and found a projecter & did 6ft 4ft movie screenings in my living room!)

However now I'm a little hard pressed to make my fantastic dough bases... in another nearby thread someone mentioned you can freeze the dough. My question is do you freeze it as a lump after it's risen or do you make the base and freeze it from there? And should you add the toppings too or is that just silly? = )

CLARABEL

I freeze it after rising in a lump if I am feeling lazy, or I make up bases, and even whole pizzas then freeze them.

Any way works, it just depends on how much time you have!

I always make up pizzas if I have time, cos then I have a frozen HM pizza ready to cok for another day!

Clara:j

dlb

Thanks for this thread, i was planning on making my first hm pizza later for tea, but know i know i can freeze them i will make a couple to freeze too!

Eels100

Ooooh tim_n, would you mind sharing your dough recipe please?

CLARABEL

hiya

here's mine...I use cups here so that the recipe can be either handmade or done in a bread machine ( sooooo easy!!!)

3 cups white flour ( at least 1 of which should be strong, but can be all. I do half and half normal to strong to save money)

1 and 1/8 cup warm water ( blood temp )

1 tsp salt

1 tbs sugar

1/3 sachet fast action yeast ( or normal yeast which needs activating in the water and sugar first )

1 tbs olive oil

Mix dry ingredients together, then add water and oil, knead well for about 5 mins, dough should be smooth and elastic. Leave to rise covered with a tea towel somewhere warm for about 2-3 hrs or longer, it should double in size) or of course put into bread machine on the dough setting!!

When risen, roll out and top!

For the base sauce....

1 box passata( lidl 25p)

1 crushed garlic clove

salt and pepper

1 tbs olive oil

1 tbs balsamic vinegar

Mix these together, this will make enough base for around 5 or 6 pizzas, so i freeze it in little tubs to be used as needed

Lidl mozarella is a great cheese for these pizzas too!

HTH
Clara:j

Eels100

Thanks CLARABEL! Don't laugh, but what exactly does 'strong' mean with regard to flour? I have wholemeal bread flour for use in the breadmaker (it's always disastrous though) and maybe I could combine that with normal flour for the dough?

Sorry to hijack, tim_n.

tim_n

hehe, well they were fantastic to me as the underneath was baked though it still kept quite goey by my sauce! Everyone loved to come over as the pizzas were quite often about 2ftx1ft in length and I'd do three for about five people! Considering we used to get the strong flour from my friend who worked in a bakery (it was a re-allocation of resources) as well as the yeast, the entire cost was about three kilos of mature cheese (dumpster dived! - free!) fresh tomatoes, basil, corgettes & chillies from my garden. The only £££'s spent was the electicity and the peppers (mine always go black :- ( )

The beer was from expired woodfordes kit (We lived near the brewery and used fresh yeast direct from them - £0.25p a pot!) which cost about £8 and made 40 pints (20p a pint!)

Real student living = )

tim_n

Remember rectangular pizzas fit better in the oven = )

CLARABEL

eels...

strong flour is a special bread flour you buy. it's a lot more expensive than normal plain flour but it's waht makes bread sccessful..high gluten content i think..

anyway, if you have normal wholemeal, you can use it in pizza bases, but I really think you should add strong flour too..look out fo it next time you shop, you'll see it. cheapest place is lidl that i've found at 59p a bag.

HTH

Clara:j

Linda32

CLARABEL wrote:

For the base sauce....

1 box passata( lidl 25p)

1 crushed garlic clove

salt and pepper

1 tbs olive oil

1 tbs balsamic vinegar

Mix these together, this will make enough base for around 5 or 6 pizzas, so i freeze it in little tubs to be used as needed

This sounds excellent, I was expectingthat to be enough for just one base :T

Justone question though, divvy I know buthow long does it take to defrost, I know it depends on the size of the container, say a butter dish.
When its defrosted do you just spread it on the dough base then

I've made home made pizza but buy tom puree in the tube and squeeze enough on to spread out. I thought that was money saving :rotfl: