Twice a week we fire up for the wood-burning oven to allow guests to cook their own pizza. You can make your own, bring them or this year we're also offering cheese and tomato pizza for people to buy at the farm. The perfect lazy choice. But for those who aren't lazy! Here's our favourite pizza dough recipe.
PAN PIZZA
1 and 2/3 cups of warm
water (all our recipes use cups and measuring spoons as measurements as there
are no scales in the tents)
2 and 1/2 tsp fast
acting dry yeast
2 tsp salt
1/4 cup of olive oil
(just regular, not your best extra virgin)
4 cups strong bread
flour
In large bowl mix
together the water, yeast, and salt.
Stir until dissolved and then stir in the olive oil, then the
flour. It should start sticky but then
all start to come together.
Sprinkle a little flour
onto the wooden worksurface of the kitchen and turn the dough out. You can cut the dough into three or four
pieces at this point to give children the chance to knead their own dough. Knead, or let them knead the dough for five
minutes.
Wash your mixing bowl
(or a number of smaller bowls if you have little helpers), then dry and rub a
few drops of oil on the inside to grease slightly. Put the dough in the bowl, or bowls, and turn
it so it is oiled and then drape a clean tea towel over. If your stove is not lit, now would be a good
time to light it. Place your dough in a
warm place (on the table in the sun, or to the side of the stove) until around
doubled in size.
Take the dough and punch
it down with your fist and turn out onto a board.
If you haven’t already,
now cut it into three of four pieces. Roll out slightly and try rolling it around your fists to make it nice and thin (this takes a bit of practice we can't tell a lie!) you can do this by the pizza oven as we have baking paper there so you can place them on paper ready for going in the oven. Use one of the pizza trays we have available and then add your
chosen topping. Pop into the oven and
don’t go anywhere! If the oven is hot it
will cook in just a few minutes.
That’s
it!
Our
favourite toppings:
·
Garden
tomatoes; simply gather up the freshest garden tomatoes in a mix of colours and
shapes and slice thinly. Drizzle a
little oil over the dough, rub over a garlic clove then add a thin layer of
tomatoes, add salt and pepper then whack in the oven. When out of the oven grate over parmesan and
add some basil leaves.
·
Cheese
and tomatoes; as above but add on dollops of mozzarella and a few shavings of
cheddar and a drizzle of balsamic vinegar
·
Olives
and anchovies, Smear the dough with tomato paste (just regular readymade pasta
sauce from a jar is just fine) then sprinkle chopped olives, sliced spring
onions and a few anchovies.
·
Cheese
and chilli, grate a strong cheddar cheese over the door and a sprinkling of
chopped chillies. Add cubed chorizo for
a meaty punch
