Authentic Italian Pizza Crust

Many years ago, I was lucky enough to help my mom work on the family cookbook in time for a family reunion. Most of our relatives, from all over Ontario and Italy, sent us their most treasured family recipes... including my Great Aunt's coveted pizza dough recipe.

Mushroom and Chicken Pizza

Since then, I have used this recipe to make several hundred pizzas, flatbreads, bread sticks, cinnamon buns, and sticky buns. It's incredibly versatile, it freezes well, it tastes fantastic with almost any ingredients, and it's almost impossible to screw up.

On Saturday, Shane and I made thirteen small pizzas. Why so many? They make fantastic freezer food, and we had a ton of vegetables from our visit to the farmer's market. Instead of baking them straightaway, we covered the pizzas in aluminum foil and stuffed them in the freezer to enjoy at a later date - making them a fabulous, healthy, preservative-free, fast food for when we don't feel like cooking or have no time.

Authentic Italian Pizza Crust
Makes 3 large pizzas, or a dozen small pizzas. 

Ingredients:

2 1/4 tsp Traditional Yeast
1 Tbsp Granulated Sugar
2 Tbsp Olive Oil
3 Cups Hot Water
8 Cups All-Purpose Flour + Extra
Extra Olive Oil

For starters, grab a large mixing bowl and add the yeast, sugar and 2 tablespoons of olive oil. Slowly pour in 1 cup of hot water (water should be very warm, but not hot enough to scald your fingers - shower temperature) and mix gently. Let this mixture sit for about ten minutes until the yeast is foamy and bubbly.

Add a cup of flour to the frothy yeast mixture, and stir. Alternate between cups of flour and cups of hot water. Mixture should take three cups of water total (including the water for the yeast mixture) and as much flour as required to make a soft round dough. At some point you'll have to dig in with your hands to work in additional flour until the dough is no longer sticky. 

Pat dough into a soft round ball in the center of the bowl. coat sides of bowl with olive oil and then drizzle oil on top of dough. Spread oil into top of dough with your fingers. Cover bowl with a clean, damp towel and leave in a warm corner of the kitchen for 1 1/2 hours or until dough has risen double. 

Punch down dough, and it's ready to work with! At this point, you can either freeze it in sections or make some hot, fresh, delicious pizza. Pinch off a piece of dough and stretch it with your hands, flattening and pulling it into a perfect pizza crust shape (if you feel the need to toss the dough in the air like the stereotypical Italian pizza chef, now is the time).

Preheat oven to 425F, and either lightly grease a pan or pizza stone with some olive oil or spread with cornmeal. Flatten dough onto pan. Spread with pizza sauce and desired toppings.

The entire time between putting the dough on the pan, topping it and putting it in the oven should be at least twenty minutes to allow the dough some time to rise once more, this way it winds up being a crispy light pizza dough.

Bake in a hot oven for 20-30 minutes, or until edges of crust begin to turn golden brown and cheese is bubbly and delicious. Enjoy with a glass of red wine!

Yummy variations: I've added many different things to this crust over the years. Half a cup of grated parmesan cheese and a quarter cup of minced garlic make a delicious savoury crust. Or sautée some spinach, pesto and garlic together to make a fun, green-flecked crust.

Hot, delicious hand made pizza.

edit: submitted to Yeastspotting. 

Heavenly Hash Cheesecake Recipe

Nothing says Happy Birthday quite like cheesecake. Today is my sister's 22nd birthday, and instead of some fabulous sugar confection of a cake, she requested cheesecake in the flavour of her favourite ice cream - heavenly hash.

After scouring various recipe websites, I was unable to find a recipe for heavenly hash cheesecake, and so I wound up modifying this recipe for Hershey's Chocolate Marble Cheesecake (well, plus some chopped dark chocolate and freshly toasted pecans).

For those who are brave enough to try the recipe for themselves, I've copied it below (along with my modifications). If you don't feel like trying it, I suppose you will just have to gaze at the photograph and drool. 

Heavenly Hash Cheesecake Recipe

Ingredients:

Crust

1 1/4 cup graham cracker crumbs

1/3 cup granulated sugar

1/4 cup cocoa powder

1/4 cup melted butter

Cake

3 8oz. packages cream cheese

3/4 cup + 1/4 cup granulated sugar

1/2 cup sour cream

3 Tbsp flour

2 tsp vanilla extract

3 eggs

1/4 cup cocoa

1 Tbsp oil

Topping

1 cup pecans, freshly toasted and chopped

2 bars of decent quality dark chocolate (I used one with nuts and one without)

Preheat oven to 350F, and lightly grease a spring form pan. Combine ingredients for crust, press into the bottom of the spring form pan to form crust (I always press with my fingertips or the bottom of a drinking glass). Bake in oven for ten minutes - I took this opportunity to toast the pecans in the same oven. Cool crust thoroughly. 

Using an electric mixer, beat together packages of cream cheese until well combined and very creamy. Slowly add 3/4 cup of sugar, continue beating and scraping the edges of the bowl until no lumps remain. Fold in sour cream, flour and vanilla, then beat thoroughly. Add eggs one at a time, beating constantly. 

In a separate bowl, mix together 1/4 cup sugar, cocoa powder and oil. Slowly add about 1 1/2 cups of the cream cheese mixture and mix thoroughly. 

In a third bowl, mix together toasted pecans and one of the bars of dark chocolate (finely chop the dark chocolate first). 

In the spring form pan, layer together spoonfuls of vanilla mixture, chocolate mixture, and the occasional sprinkling of chopped pecans mixture, until all mixtures have been used up. Reserve about half of the pecan mixture for sprinkling on top. Take a knife and lightly swirl together mixtures to create a 'marbled' effect. Increase oven heat to 450F. Bake cake for 10 minutes, then without opening the oven door, decrease heat to 250F and bake for an additional 30 minutes. Shut oven off, and let cool in hot oven for 30 minutes more (without opening oven door). Loosen edges of cake from pan with a knife, then allow to cool in the fridge for several hours. Serve chilled with slices of dark chocolate on top.

This cake earned rave reviews from my family members, and most importantly, from my sister. Happy birthday!