Un Racconto di Due Pizze

Funny the convoluted paths that some of my posts take before being published. Today’s is a case in point. Originally this was to be a post about Naan pizzas. Originally.

For almost as long as I’ve lived in Chicago, Friday night has been “little or no cook” night. When I worked in The Loop, I often went out with my workmates for a “quick one” after work, which then led to several more before food somehow made its way to the table. On other Fridays, I met friends at a nearby watering hole and we often ended up at a restaurant or in one of our apartments ordering dinner before heading out for the night. Pizza was often a part of the remaining Fridays — but they were delivered.

Much has changed in my life since then but the 2 things that have remained constant are that I don’t do a lot of cooking on Friday nights and I still love pizza. Enter Naan pizza. With Naan as my pizza crust, I can easily prepare pizza with whatever toppings I want or that I have on-hand — just like my “clean out the fridge frittata”, another Friday night favorite. And that was to be the post: making Naan pizza. Then I went to the wrong grocery store.

Naan is available at all the grocery stores where I shop — save one and, of course, that’s where I found myself on a recent Friday afternoon. I’d been running errands all morning and, once I discovered my mistake, I didn’t feel much like heading to another grocery, That’s when inspiration struck. Realizing that I had some very active sourdough starter on my counter, I decided to go traditional and make my own pizza crust. My “Naan Pizza” post suddenly became “A Tale of Two Pizzas”, one old-style and one Naan.

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Prosciutto Pizza Recipe

Ingredients

• Pizza dough (Recipe follows)
• a few tablespoons of Pistachio Pesto
• marinated artichoke hearts, well-drained
• several asparagus spears, chopped and briefly sautéed in butter or olive oil, drained
• diced prosciutto
• mozzarella (See Notes)
• Fontina cheese, grated
• diced prosciutto, garnish

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Start with pistachio pesto

Add artichokes, asparagus, prosciutto

Place the mozzarella

Cover with Fontina

Bake and garnish with prosciutto before serving

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Directions

1. Pre-heat oven to 425˚ F (220˚ C). Lightly coat a 9 X 13″ (23 X 33 cm) baking sheet with olive oil.
2. Use a rolling-pin to create a rectangle with the dough. Do not try to make it as large as needed. Place the dough in the center of the baking sheet and, with your fingertips, gently move/stretch the dough until it covers the entire sheet. If the dough recoils, let it rest for 5 or 10 minutes before resuming.
3. For a slightly thicker crust, pre-cook the crust for 10 minutes in a pre-heated oven before proceeding.
4. Apply a light coating of pesto to the top of the crust. The less oil used, the better.
5. Place the artichokes, asparagus, and prosciutto on the crust.
6. Evenly arrange the mozzarella cheese before covering the entire pizza with freshly grated Fontina cheese.
7. Bake in pre-heated oven for about 15 minutes, more or less depending upon your preference.
8. Garnish with more diced prosciutto and let rest 5 minutes before serving.

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Pizza Dough Recipe

This dough recipe is based on the Celia’s Bread #101 — A Basic Tutorial recipe in her encyclopedic blog, Fig and Lime Cordial. (Seriously, if you’re looking for a bread recipe, forget Google and head over to Celia’s.) Her recipe makes 4 crusts which is too much for me. So, I reduced the amounts but not by half. I added 50g more flour to accommodate my addition of sourdough starter, which by the way, also, came from Celia. She’s named her sourdough starter “Priscilla”, while mine has been christened “Bart, son of Priscilla”.

Ingredients

• 300 g bread flour
• 5 g yeast (See Notes)
• 1/4 cup sourdough starter
• 5 g kosher salt
• 160 ml water
• 25 ml olive oil

Directions

1. Combine all ingredients and, using a stand mixer’s dough hook, knead until a nice dough forms.
2. Separate into 2 equal parts. (Mine were 280 grams apiece.)
3. Place each in lightly oiled, container with lid, cover, and place in a warm place for an hour or until doubled in size.
4. Punch down dough, re-cover, and let rise again till doubled — about 1 hour more.
5. Take one ball of dough, wrap it tightly in plastic/cling wrap, and freeze. The night before it’s needed, place in the fridge to defrost.
6. Prepare the remaining dough ball as you would normally when making pizza.

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Now that the traditional pizza is out-of-the-way, we can turn to the “I want pizza now!” pizza recipe. These pizzas shouldn’t take more than a half hour to prepare — and that’s from start to burning the roof of your mouth. Use whatever toppings and as much of each as you like. Following the prosciutto pizza, I’ve listed 3 more, 2 of which are meatless.

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Spinach~Prosciutto Naan Pizza

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Ingredients

• Naan
• Pesto Genovese – get recipe HERE.
• mozzarella (See Notes)
• crumbled goat cheese
• hand-torn pickled cherry bomb peppers ( See Notes)
• fresh baby spinach, very lightly dressed with olive oil, red wine vinegar, salt & pepper (See Notes)
• thinly sliced prosciutto

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Pesto Base

Mozzarella & Goat Cheese

Peppers

Baked

Prosciutto & Spinach Topped

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Directions

1. Pre-heat oven to 425˚ F (220 ˚C).
2. Lightly coat top of the Naan with pesto.
3. Place the mozzarella and then sprinkle with the grated goat cheese.
4. Add the cherry bomb peppers.
5. Bake in a pre-heated oven for 12 to 15 minutes, depending upon your preference.
6. Remove from oven and immediately top with the dressed spinach leaves. Place torn slices of prosciutto on the top of the pizza and serve.

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Variations

Roasted grape tomatoes, sardines, sautéed kale, mozzarella, grated Pecorino Romano cheese

Anchovies, capers, tinned diced fire-roasted tomatoes, mozzarella, grated Pecorino Romano cheese

Spicy salami, tinned diced fire-roasted tomatoes, chopped kalamata olives, mozzarella, fresh basil garnish

Originally, the above 3 pizzas were to be part of a Naan Pizza post. Once I made a pizza using my own crust, however, these 3 took a back seat to the prosciutto pizzas. Still, they do prove my point that the topping possibilities are endless and oftentimes my Friday night pizza, much like my Friday night frittata, helps me clear out my fridge. On the left is a pizza topped with sardines and kale, the top right is an anchovy and caper pizza, while the bottom pie is made with spicy salami and kalamata olives. Click on an image to reveal that pizza’s remaining ingredients.

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Notes

When making these pizzas, I often use small mozzarella balls called ciliegine, so named because they are cherry-sized and ciliege is the Italian word for cherries. Other times, I use “mozzarella pearls” which are about half the size of ciliegine.

When using Naan for my crust, I use a baking sheet and wouldn’t suggest baking your pizza on a pizza stone. Naan is already fully cooked and it will likely burn on a pizza stone while your pizza’s toppings are being heated.

I used yeast this time around because I wasn’t sure that I’d have enough time to allow the sourdough to rise, having spent the day running errands. Normally, I start the dough in the morning and, when it’s ready, pre-bake the crust, then hold it until I’m ready to fix dinner.

Use as much or as little of any ingredient listed, according to your own preferences.

The pickled cherry bomb peppers I used here came from my garden and added a bit of heat to the pizza. Use whatever pepper/chile you prefer.

Dress the spinach leaves sparingly with oil and vinegar. Remember that any excess will drain on to your pizza.

I prefer to place the spinach on the pizza first so that the pizza’s heat will lightly wilt the leaves. You may prefer to place the prosciutto on first.

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It’s déjà vu all over again …

Today’s look back features Pasta al Salmone, Pasta with Salmon. I first tasted this delicious pasta while in Italy for the first time. It was love at first bite. It took me a number of years to replicate that dish but I finally did and now I can enjoy Pasta al Salmone without having to deal with airports and surly flight attendants. You can see the recipe by clicking HERE.

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Coming soon to a monitor near you …

Homemade Garganelli Pasta

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