The ingredients: Extra Virgin Olive Oil, Med Sea Salt, Diced Tomatoes, Pizza Dough. We worked on this blog post after school so we decided to start with pre-made dough to get through this recipe quicker. Note: The pre-made dough comes from ELI's MARKET and is 100% natural. Just Olive Oil, Yeast, Flour and Salt.
Alexa started us off pouring in the canned diced tomatoes. These are delicious.
Then the olive oil. The canned tomatoes are a bit watery so we will cook them for some time to really dry them out to make a chunky natural tomato sauce.
Some Med sea salt... Drum roll please... Now for the super secret ingredient.
Shhhhh....
Sugar! Yes, the sugar helps reduce the acidity in the tomatoes. So once they cook over medium heat for about 20-30 minutes - the oil and salt will add great flavor and texture and the wateryness will go away! The sugar makes the tomatoes so sweet and yummy!
Just look at the color! All natural ingredients. You can also add some basil to the tomatoes while they cook for extra flavor and then remove the leaves before pouring over the dough.
While the tomato sauce is cooking on the stove - we begin the pizza process. We start by flouring up our work stations.
We left each other about a foot or two of space.
You can make pretty swirly patterns with the flour.
You might have noticed we are not using a rolling pin... We decided to hand stretch the dough. A not so easy technique but very rewarding.....and a bit frustrating for Alexa...
So you pound on the dough and make as round and thin as you can with your fist. Then begin poking the dough with your fingers to stretch, then lift the dough and nuckle the dough till it stretches.
Perfect hand stretching!
Make sure its thin, but not thin enough to hold toppings and make sure it doesn't tear!
It took Alexa a bit longer to get the hang of it - It's not easy!
Emma kept going - we had 6 pizzas to make!
Go Alexa Go! After her first try - Alexa was hand stretching dough!
Feelin' good!
Rockin' and Rollin'!
Quick check on the sauce.....Yum....It's almost ready, look at those bubbles!
Wateryness is almost gone! Chunky tomato sauce - here we come!
Time to spread Olive Oil on the uncooked crust. Alexa is very focused here. We don't have a brush - so we use the back of the tablespoon to spread - it wont tear the dough.
Sauce is ready. Its's chunky and sweet - just delicious!
Emma starts spreading the sauce over the olive oil. Smells yummy!
Can you see how chunky it is? All natural tomatoes and Olive Oil!
Remember that if the crust is too thin - the sauce and toppings will cook through and your pizza will be soggy.
For her dairy free pizza - Alexa opted out of adding veggies as toppings and went for a plain tomato pizza. You can add Veggies, soy cheese or anything you like!
Remember Alexa usually scraped off the tomato sauce - so we'll see if she likes this sauce! Fingers crossed :)
Emma is making a dairy pizza for herself now that Alexa's is done. Low moisture Mozz shredded cheese. Low moisture so it doesn't cook too watery and ruin the pizza. No soggy pizza!
We like Reynolds wrap non stick foil. So you will notice we use it a lot - no more sticky pizza to foil for us!
Finished Pizza!
Since Emma was so good at this - we asked her to make one for her parents with Olives!
Looks soooo good! Emma is pressing the olives in the dough.
Pizza cooks fast in high heat! Don't walk away from the oven - in less than 10 mins the pizza will be done (450 degrees).
Ta - Dah! Alexa's pizza is done! Smells amazing.
Emma's pizza looks great too! Cheesy bubbles!
We are using our new pizza cutter - so easy to cut through any crust and fun too!
Drum roll please...........
Alexa loves it! No scraping tomato sauce off this pizza! Hurray. Thumbs up!
Thumbs up for Emma too!
To celebrate the occasion of hard work well done - we ate in front of the TV and caught up on some of our favorites! It's a great night!
After dinner - we realized we had extra dough... So we decided to make focaccia. And since our parents love olives - we would use the remaining olives (Kalamata - pitted) for the focaccia.
So...
Spread the dough and make it as thin without any tears. Brush with olive oil (extra virgin) or use the back of a tablespoon to spread the oil. Sprinkle with Med Sea Salt.
Then place the olives (pitted always) on the dough and push each one into the dough so they stick when it cooks.
Less than 10 mins in the oven at high temps (450) and VOILA'!
Focaccia di Olive
Enjoy!
