Not only did our gracious hosts put a roof over our heads but they went out of their way to feed us up on some great food, some of which was home made pizza. I've tried pizza before, a long time a go, and it was a disaster. Bland bland bland, I feel so sorry for the poor people too polite to tell me I'd made a dreadful meal. But after sampling how delicious home made pizza could be, and how simple the lovely Caitlin made it look I was determined to redeem myself.
Not only was it simple and really easy to prepare, but I had a lot of fun doing it. Until my first pizza deceived me. It looked wonderful in the oven, cooking away, toasting the cheese to a beautiful golden brown. Boy, this is a breeze I thought, I should have thought of doing this sooner....uh ohhh! The pizza came out of the oven and refused to let go of its cozy stone. I actually think the two became one. For no amount of trying, I could not get this pizza off the stone. Ready to throw in the towel and phone the ever reliable take away, Kris insisted on calling the pro cooks up in Scotland to see if there was a trick we were missing. There was, apparently you have to coat the surface of the pizza stone in a thick layer of flour to prevent sticking. Bah, nowhere on the box told of this so I assume (and hope, so don't feel like so much of a dufus) they also learned the hard way. By this time, the stone was far from rescue, so I took note of their tips for next time and threw the rest of the prepared pizzas on baking trays and sent them into the oven.I'm sure, if I used the stone, the pizzas would have been a little crispier but boy were they good just as they were. By the time I finished the last offering there was only scraps of crust left, good job I hid my very own caramelised onion and goat cheese pizza till last, mwahaha. All in all, after what I thought was to be the end of my pizza making career, I think I did good. Im proud of my little mis-shapen babies.
You can find pizza dough recipes all over the Internet, mine was taken from Jamie's Italy (linked here from his website) and included a combination of pepperoni, paprika salami, parma ham, red and green chilli's, chili oil, caramelised onion and goat cheese.
In a vain effort to drag more readers to my little blog (one of my new year resolutions is to become a more active blogger) I will be submitting my pizzas to Yeastspotting.
