Pizza Party

I usually buy pizza dough from Whole Foods, mostly because I usually don't think about dinner more than a day in advance - which is necessary for pizza dough, because it has to sit overnight. But I figured it was about time to be a big girl and learn how to make it myself. Who better to consult on pizza dough than my friend Seth, who made his television debut with Mama's pie on the Today Show last September. Why is it called Mama's? Well, that's another story for another day. Here, for your viewing pleasure, is the video of the Today Show pizza segment:

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

And Here is Seth's recipe for pizza dough:

2 1/4 cups all purpose flour, chilled
4 teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon yeast
1/8 cup olive oil
7/8 cup water, ice cold

Stir together flour, salt, and yeast. Create well in center of dry ingredients and add cold water, incorporating the dry ingredients until the water is absorbed (a minute or two).




Add olive oil and stir until absorbed. Knead the dough by hand for about 5 minutes (not too long or the dough won’t rise enough). At this point, the dough should be sticky, but not wet. Shape the dough into a ball and coat with olive oil or olive oil spray. Store in airtight container (e.g., a Ziplock bag) in refrigerator overnight.



Overnight? But what to do with all that time? Go to a Cubs game!



Remove dough and place on floured surface, dust with flour, spray with olive oil spray, and cover with plastic wrap.
Let rise for 2 hours.



Stretch/form dough by hand so that the pizza has a very thin crust (approx. 1/8 thick) but keep the crust edge much thicker (at least ½ inch thick).



Coat bottom of pizza with a thin layer of olive oil, sprinkle generously with corn meal, then flip to prepare toppings.



Cook pizza, preferably on a pizza stone, at 500 degrees for 10-15 minutes. The crust edges should be browned and crispy. If using a wood or coal burning oven, cook for 5 minutes, or until crust edge is browned and crispy.



After it finished cooking, I added some arugula on top.



Good job, me! The only thing I did slightly differently was instead of coating one side of the dough with olive oil and corn meal and then flipping, i sprinkled corn meal on the baking sheet and just put the dough right on there once it was stretched out. The dough was really easy to work with, and the end result was very tasty. And FYI - I used active dry yeast. I know there are lots of different kinds out there. Yay for homemade pizza!