Semi Homemade Gourmet Pizza Recipes

GOURMET HOMEMADE PIZZA

Steps:

• In a large bowl (dough will rise considerably!), combine all the dough ingredients and stir well, until smooth. It will be stiff, but be sure all the flour is incorporated. Cover the bowl and let stand at room temperature approximately 18-24 hours. Doing this the night before is best.
• Using a silicone bowl scraper, scrape the dough onto a well floured surface. It will seem very loose and sticky at this point still. That's normal. Generously dust the top of the dough with some flour, then use the bowl scraper or a bench scraper to roll the dough around a bit in the flour on the work surface, to coat thinly. You will find it should quickly become workable and no longer sticky. Divide the dough into two equal pieces (or four, for mini pizzas). Shape each piece into a ball, then cover with a clean towel and let rest for 1 hour.
• Prepare your oven: Place your pizza stone into the cold oven on a rack in the lower third of the oven. I like to remove any top rack at this point, too, just to not have that obstacle when transferring the pizza into and out of the oven. Preheat oven to the highest setting, typically 500F. Let the oven preheat while your dough rests.
• Prepare your sauce: If you are making your own pizza sauce, prepare that when the dough is resting as well. Using a fine mesh strainer, drain the juice from the canned tomatoes, then gently squeeze the tomatoes to let some of the juice inside the tomatoes drain off as well. Place the tomatoes into a food processor, with the garlic, olive oil, spices and a generous pinch of salt. Pulse a few times, to break it up, but not so much that it is completely smooth. A few small pieces of tomato visible is about right. Set aside.
• Dust a sheet of parchment paper with flour or cornmeal. Take a ball of dough and gently stretch it out a bit. Place it on your prepared parchment and gently, using just your fingertips so you don't deflate the dough too much, press and stretch outward to shape the pizza and make it bigger. If it seems to not be enlarging much, lift it up by the outside edge and let it hang in the air. The weight of the dough will stretch it out. Rotate around the edge and let it stretch in the same way. Return the dough to the parchment and finish stretching and shaping. If you like a thin crust pizza, your dough will need to be quite thin. Leave the outside edges thicker, for the lovely bubbly edge crust.
• Spread the pizza sauce on the dough. Place 2-3 slices of prosciutto onto the pizza. I like to twist it a bit so it doesn't lay flat on the sauce. This helps to get some lovely, crisp prosciutto as it bakes. Scatter some goat cheese on top, then some shredded mozzarella (not too much, just enough to fill in here and there).
• Bake your pizza:
• Trim the parchment paper close to your pizza, so there is little excess that might scorch in the hot oven. Using a pizza peel, transfer your pizza on top of the parchment paper and onto the hot pizza stone. Allow to bake 7-8 minutes. If you like, you can very carefully pull the parchment paper out from under the pizza at this point. Allow the pizza to continue baking until the crust underneath has some good colour, the topping are bubbly and the top edges of the crust are quite dark in spots. Remove pizza to a cutting board and allow to rest a couple of minutes. Top with fresh arugula to serve.

GOURMET CHICKEN PIZZA

Steps:

• Preheat oven to 425 degrees F (220 degrees C). Lightly grease a pizza pan or medium baking sheet.
• Place chicken in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Cook until no longer pink, and juices run clear. Cool, then either shred or chop into small pieces.
• Unroll dough, and press into the prepared pizza pan or baking sheet. Bake crust for 7 minutes in the preheated oven, or until it begins to turn golden brown. Remove from oven.
• Spread ranch dressing over partially baked crust. Sprinkle on mozzarella cheese. Place tomatoes, green onion, and chicken on top of mozzarella cheese, then top with Cheddar cheese. Return to the oven for 20 to 25 minutes, until cheese is melted and bubbly.

SEMI-HOMEMADE GOURMET PIZZA

Steps:

• Spread out pillsbury pizza crust & flatten as much as you can. They tend to rise quite a bit.
• Spread both sides with olive oil.
• Sprinkle both sides generously with italian or pizza seasoning.
• Bake at 350 for 12 minutes and remove from oven.
• While baking crust, begin preparing ingredients. Chop and saute sausage until browned.
• Remove from pan & spoon into separate bowl.
• Add onion, basil, mushrooms and tomato slices into saute pan and add dash of olive oil (my husband didn't care for the tomatoes, but they were easily removed after cooking).
• Cook veggies until onions are translucent and remove from heat.
• Flip crust over so that crusty side is facing up and spoon sauce onto crust.
• Sprinkle sausage and veggie mixture over sauce.
• Sprinkle mozzarella cheese evenly onto pizza and top with colby jack cheese.
• Bake pizza at 350 for 15 minutes.
• Cool for a few minutes and slice into 8 pieces.