Pizza What????

There are moments in my life, I dislike homemade pizza.

I dislike homemade pizza when friends call and say "Would you like to go out for a slice of cheesey goodness?" and I say "No." because I know I will be served a piece of cardboard with a funky tomato sauce or fake cheese.

I dislike homemade pizza when I hear co-workers call in an order for pick-up and their supper will be ready in 20 minutes. And my supper will take at least an hour after I get home.

And I dislike homemade pizza when I ate half the pizza when I should have had only one slice. Yea ...... I'm always watching my weight. Most of the time, I watch it go up!!!

But I NEVER dislike homemade pizza when its in the oven -- the smell of roasted veggies on it -- the wonderful spicey but rich tomato sauce -- and especially, when I make the mozzarella to go on top.

I talk about making pizza a lot. And that's because its a twice a month event at Miss Effie's. So here is my recipe for pizza crust.

This one is made in a bread machine. Honey bought me a bread machine several years ago. I searched out recipes forever .... I quit baking bread in the bread machine cuz I didn't like the funky hole in the bottom of the loaf of bread from the paddle. But I continued to use it to mix and raise the dough --- until No-knead bread and ABin5 came into my life. Now ...... the bread machine is used for pizza. So .... if you have one sitting around, put it to good use and make pizza dough.

Preheat oven to 425 degrees.

Pizza Dough

5/8 cup of warm water
1 TBSP olive oil
2 cups of white bread flour
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp sugar
1/2 tsp instant yeast

Put into the bread machine and put on pizza setting. If you don't have a pizza setting use the dough setting but the dough only needs to rise once...... it most cases, it will be ready in an hour.

Let it rest a few minutes and shape. You want to bake it on an oiled pizza pan or sprinkle your pizza stone with cornmeal. I will shape the crust on an oiled cookie sheet and slide it onto the preheated pizza stone.

Bake the crust only for 5-7 minutes. Then pull it out of the oven and put on the toppings. Then back into the oven for another 10-15 minutes.

Last night -- we used our home canned pizza sauce, roasted mushrooms with garlic and red onions, pork sausage from Geest Family farms and my homemade mozzarella. It was great!

Now the crust I made last night had 7-grain flour in it and a tsp of Italian seasonings. When I do that -- I use 2/3 to 3/4 of the white bread flour and a 1/4 to 1/3 of the speciality flour. So last night -- I used 1-1/2 cup white bread flour and 1/2 cup of the 7-grain flour.

And for the record.......... I never dislike homemade pizza when I am eating it!!!!