How to Make a Pizza

This is a simple way to make your pizzas so it isn't too time consuming, but keep in mind, good food doesn't come without time. First, you must make the pizza dough (you can find the recipe here).

After you let the pizza dough rise for 1 to 2 hours, you can preheat the oven to 500 degrees with the pizza stone (if you don't have one, see here). The oven should remain at 500 degrees for at heat 45 minutes before you put the first pizza in, or your pizza will not cook evenly, or "correctly".

Next it is time for you to roll out the pizza dough. You should roll it out to about 15 inches, but you can do it more if your pizza stone is big enough to hold it. You do not want the dough to be paper thin because it will just break, you want it to be about a 1/4 of an inch thick, maybe a little thinner. It is really your choice, the question is how much pizza dough you like per bite.

Next, get some parchment and put it on a pizza peel (see here) or a flat wooden cutting board. Emphasis on the word flat! It must be flat so you can easily slide it into the oven. Anyway, put parchment on a cutting board and add some cornmeal (this is not essential, but to get a good texture, it is very helpful). Now it is time to put the pizza onto the pizza peel. If you put the rolling pin onto the dough and wrap the dough around the rolling pin and lift it onto the pizza peel, it will be easy to move the dough from where you rolled it out to the pizza peel.

Now it is time to top it. This is where the creativity part comes in. You can really take it anywhere from here. From potato pizza to arugula pesto to your old fashioned favorite, cheese. Put the sauce on, whether it be garlic oil, creme fraiche, or tomato sauce.

Topping time! Some of my favorites are:

• grilled bell peppers
• grilled onions
• caramelized onions
• mama lil peppers
• pepperoncini
• olives
• salami
• chorizo
• italian sausage
• potatoes
• pancetta
• herbs (basil, oregano, thyme)

And I could go on forever to be completely honest, but why would I do that when the best part of making homemade pizza is coming up with new things to try! Last but not lease you need cheese. This is a preference, but you can use any of the below, or all of the below!

• Parmesan
• Pecorino-Romano
• Mozzarella
• Gruyere (Potato Pizza)

Now it is time to cook it. I usually go about 10 minutes or anything around that time, it really depends on how you like it and how your oven cooks. I just watch it, but it will almost always be more than 5 minutes so that is a safe time for you to leave the kitchen. To put the pizza in, slide the pizza on the parchment and let it cook until it looks done (the cheese is bubbly and the crust slightly brown). Pull it out WITHOUT burning yourself and let it sit for at least 2 minutes. It is finally time to indulge! Enjoy!