What You’ll Need To Make Mushroom Turkey And Swiss Cheese Pizza Recipe Suggestion – Make your dough the night before you plan to bake your pizza, this will allow plenty of time for the dough to rise and also adds to the flavor of your crust)

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7 Secret Tips For Making Great Pizza Crust At Home

Pizza Crust Ingredients:
* 1 teaspoon white sugar
* 1 1/2 cup warm water (110 degrees F/45 degrees C- No need to boil the water)
* 2 packages of Active Dry Yeast (AYD) – Easily obtained form any grocery store
* 1 small bottle of Extra Virgin Olive Oil
* 1-teaspoon salt
* 1 ¾ cups of Enriched Unbleached Bread Flour

Accessories
1- Roller Pin (Or a rollable surface to flatten the dough)
1- 14” Perforated Pizza Pan (The kind with the holes punched into the bottom of the pan)
2- Large Bowls for Mixing
2- Kitchen towels or equivalent

Making The Pizza Dough

Pour 1-½ cups of warm water in a bowl (Approx 105 –115 degrees) Empty the 2 packages of Active Dry Yeast into the bowl and stir until fully dissolved. Set to the side for approximately 20 minutes.

In a separate bowl mix the remaining dry ingredients (Enriched unbleached bread flour, salt, and the sugar).
Check the yeast mixture to ensure that the yeast has become active. It will appear to have increased in volume.

Slowly began to pour small amounts of the dry ingredients into the yeast and water mixture, stirring as you add the mixture. Continue to add the dry mixture until the mixture becomes solid and somewhat “clumpy”. Once you have added all of the dry ingredients to the yeast and water mixture, add approximately 1-½ teaspoons of olive oil to the mixture and continue to knead by hand. If needed, add a little more water to insure the dough is manageable. The kneading process can take 15 -25 minutes to make sure the dough is well blended.

Make sure the dough is well blended, and roll (by hand) into a dough balls Roll the dough ball around in any leftover flour (plain white) that is available. Finally, with a small amount of olive oil, brush the dough balls lightly to moisten and place in separate bowl that you will cover with a wet kitchen cloth and place in the refrigerator overnight. For best results I suggest at least 8-12 hours… however you can use the dough if needed after 2-3 hours.

Tip: Want to add a little flair to your pizza crust?

Try adding a blend of fresh herbs to the dough… Careful… Don’t over do it.. just enough to add flavor. To add the special touch once you’ve created the dough and dressed the pizza sprinkle left over herbs lightly over the exposed dough that can be seen around the outer crust of the pizza.

Preparing The Pizza Sauce

Ingredients:
1 –15 ounce can of tomato sauce
1- 6 ounce can of tomato paste
1 ½ teaspoons of Extra Virgin Olive Oil
1 teaspoon of minced garlic
1 teaspoon of ground oregano (Mediterranean preferred)
1 teaspoon of Italian seasoning
1 teaspoon of Basil Leaves (Mediterranean preferred)

Pour the tomato paste and tomato sauce into a bowl. Add all seasonings including the olive oil. Stir until all ingredients are thoroughly blended. This should result in a smooth tomato sauce… if more smoothness is desired add just a touch more olive oil. Set aside for 3-5 minutes.
Preparing The Pizza Crust:

Remove the dough from the refrigerator when ready. Shape your pizza dough to fil your desired pan width. If you haven’t already seen the video for shaping pizza dough go here:

Ingredients:
4 White mushrooms (diced finely)
2 Teaspoons Olive oil
Smoked turkey slices
Ham (thin slices)
Coarsely ground black pepper to taste
2 teaspoons Chopped parsley or basil
Grated Swiss cheese

Directions:

Tip: If you like a Southwestern taste to your pizza, substitute slices of smoked chicken breast and Monterey Jack cheese, then sprinkle with chopped cilantro.
Preheat oven to 450F. (Pre-heating your oven is critical. Never slide one of your great creations into a “cold” oven.  Heat oil in a small skillet. Add mushroom slices and cook over high heat for 2 minutes, shaking skillet. Reserve.

Cover pizza shell with diced turkey slices and ham. Top with slices mushrooms and tomato. Sprinkle with pepper to taste and 1 1/2 teaspoons parsley. Top with cheese.

Bake 8-10 minutes, or until cheese is golden and bubbly. Garnish with remaining parsley. Serve immediately.

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Few American foods are loved more that the infamous “pizza pie”. It doesn’t matter if you’re young, old or somewhere in between, almost everyone has a favorite when it comes to pizza. It would be rare to find someone that has never tried a slice of pizza.

It doesn’t matter where you’re from, what you look like or how much money you make. If you’ve got a few extra bucks and a hearty appetite, sooner or later the perfect combination of cheese, sauce, crust and toppings are going to find their way into your mouth.

Americans eat approximately 100 acres of pizza a day. (Yes…that’s ACRES) That’s a whopping 350 slices per second! This gives real meaning to the term “pizza lover”. Did you know that there are approximately 69,000 pizzerias in the United States? Approximately 3 BILLION pizzas are sold in the U.S. each year. (Source: Blumenfeld and Associates)

You probably would have guessed it - the biggest day of the year for pizza in the United States is none other than Super Bowl Sunday! There’s nothing like watching the big game with a few friends while you wait anxiously for the pizza guy to show up.

Pizza has become a very personal subject for most people. Everyone knows exactly how they want their pizza made. They can tell you exactly what type of crust they like, what size they prefer, how much sauce is “enough” sauce, and what toppings are the absolute best. Some can even tell you how long they prefer their pizza to cook in the pizza oven. There’s no doubt about it, when asked, they’ll talk about their favorite pizza with a big smile on their face.

People learn about many new cheeses and new ingredients through pizza. They love to experiment ordering pizza with unique toppings and fancy crust. Pizza crust alone has evolved through the years giving pizza lovers yet another reason to adore their favorite pies. Stuffed crust, cheesy crust, whole-wheat crust … you name it.

Pizza is loved so much that it has its own month. October is officially pizza month. Allow me to help put this into perspective for you… “Presidents” have “days”… pizza has it’s own “Month”. Oh how we love our dear pizza pies.

The thought of watching a pizza maker throw pizza dough into the air as it is being perfectly shaped brings a smile and wide eyes to most kids’ faces. The only smile that’s bigger is the smile after the first slice has been quickly consumed. According to a recent Gallup Poll, 82 percent of children ages
3 and 11 prefer pizza over chicken nuggets, hot dogs, macaroni & cheese, and hamburgers.
Pizza is here to stay. Even as many people continue to pursue weight loss programs and try to engage in healthy eating practices, pizza seems to be one of those foods that we just must have from time to time and simply don’t want to give up completely. We don’t mind diets and we surely want to become more educated about healthy eating practices but whatever you do…

Don’t take away our pizza!

California pizza, a totally different “style” of pizza has thoroughly integrated itself into the mainstream. So much so that many people do not recognize it as a separate pizza style.

In much the same way as pizza restaurants throughout the United States may carry a Chicago-style deep dish option, they may also have California-style items on the menu.

Once-innovative ingredients like barbecue, curry, eggs, or goat cheese, are now sold at more traditional pizza restaurants and chains, as simply another topping choice. California-style pizza is also quite common as frozen pre-prepared pizza.

In fact, a number of smaller and newer chains either specialize in, or carry, the California pizza style. In the fine dining end, many expensive restaurants continue to offer single-serving pizzas with expensive or exotic ingredients, baked in wood ovens, or even devote a portion of their menu to California-style pizza.

While most other styles of pizza are associated with the more traditional kind of pizza crust, the distinguishing feature of California-style pizza is the use of nontraditional toppings that derive from cuisines other than the usual Italian-style tomato sauce and mozzarella cheese, and especially incorporating fresh vegetables such as artichokes.

California-style pizza might include pizza like Thai pizza topped with bean sprouts and peanut sauce; Mexican pizza topped with carne asada, guacamole, and sour cream; Caribbean pizza topped with Jamaican jerk chicken; or chicken pizza with a white creamy garlic sauce. Breakfast pizza is in the same genre as California pizza, with toppings such as scrambled eggs and breakfast meats.

California pizzas are generally smaller than the standard eight-slice Neapolitan; most are single-serving dishes. Due to the “gourmet” nature of the California pizzas, their high menu price often misleads those from the eastern United States; almost no California style pizzas can serve more than two or three at most, yet they cost about the same as a much larger New York-style pizza.

While this provides more versatility in individual tastes, it can be surprising to those who are used to the traditional size, expecting a single pizza to serve five or six people. If you haven’t tried California style pizza give it a try for a refreshing taste in pizza.

If you haven’t already done so, try a California style pizza.

The Chicago-style “deep-dish” pizza that many people love was invented at Pizzeria Uno, in Chicago, in 1943, reportedly by Uno’s founder Ike Sewell, a former University of Texas football star. However, a 1956 article from the Chicago Daily News asserts that Uno’s original pizza chef Rudy Malnati developed the famous recipe.

The pizza’s foundation is simple. It uses a thick layer of dough (made with olive oil and cornmeal) that is formed to a deep round pan and pulled up the sides. The pizza crust is then parbaked before the toppings are added to give it greater spring.

Parbaking is a cooking technique in which a bread or dough product is partially baked and then rapidly frozen or cooled. The raw dough is baked as if normal, but halted at about 80% of the normal cooking time, when it is rapidly cooled and frozen. The partial cooking kills the yeast in the bread mixture, and sets the internal structure of the proteins and starches (the spongy texture of the bread), so that it is now essentially cooked inside, but not so far as to have generated “crust” or other externally desirable qualities that are difficult to preserve once fully cooked.

The crust is then covered with cheese (generally sliced mozzarella) and covered with meats and/or vegetables such as Italian sausage, onions, and bell peppers. A sauce consisting of crushed or pureed tomatoes is then added. Usually this is topped with a grated cheese blend to add additional flavor. On the usual pizza, about a pound of cheese is added. Because of the amount of ingredients in this style of pizza, it is usually eaten with a knife and fork. It’s quite messy to eat with your fingers.

In addition to Uno, additional famous deep-dish restaurants include Uno’s companion restaurant Due, which was opened just down the block by Sewell in 1955. However, a year before, in 1954, The Original Gino’s Pizza, located on Rush Street, opened its doors, and 12 years later in 1966, Gino’s East opened. Other deep dish restaurants include Edwardo’s, Connie’s, Giordano’s, Carmen’s, Pizano’s (which is owned by Rudy Malnati’s son, Rudy Jr.), and Lou Malnati’s (which was begun by another of Rudy Malnati’s sons and is now run by his grandsons and has 26 Chicago area locations).

Chicago deep-dish pizza is famous throughout the world. Accordingly, many Chicago deep-dish pizza restaurants will ship their pizzas, partially baked, within the continental U.S.

In the mid-1970s, two Chicago chains, Nancy’s, founded by Rocco Palese, and Giordano’s began experimenting with deep dish pizza and created the stuffed pizza. Palese based his creation on his mother’s recipe for scarciedda, an Italian Easter pie from his hometown of Potenza. A Chicago Magazine article featuring Giordano’s stuffed pizza popularized the dish. Other pizzerias that make stuffed pizzas include Bacino’s, Edwardo’s and Carmen’s. Most also make thin crust pizzas.

Stuffed pizzas are often even taller than deep-dish pizzas, but otherwise, it can be hard to see the difference until you cut into it. A stuffed pizza generally has much higher topping density than any other type of pizza. As with deep-dish pizza, a thin layer of dough forms a bowl in a high-sided pan and the toppings and cheese are added. Then, an additional layer of dough goes on top and is pressed to the sides of the bottom crust.

At this stage of the process, the thin dough top has a rounded, domed appearance. Pizza makers often puncture a small hole in the top of the “pizza lid” to allow air and steam to escape while cooking. This allows the pizza sauce to permeate through the pie. Pizza sauce is added to the top crust layer and the pizza is then baked.

Chicago pan pizza in Chicago is similar to the traditional deep-dish style pizza served in other areas of the country, and baked in a similar deep-sided pan, but its crust is quite thick — a cross between the buttery crisp crust and focaccia. Toppings and cheese frequently go on the top of a pan pizza, rather than under the sauce as is traditionally the case with deep-dish and stuffed pizza. The placement of the cheese and toppings on top make the pan pizza variety similar to a thin-crust pizza with a thicker and larger crust.

In addition to Chicago-style deep-dish pizza, there is also a thin-crust pizza unique to Chicago, sometimes referred to as “flat pizza”. The crust is thin and firm, usually with a crunchy texture, unlike a New York-style pizza, yet thick enough to be soft and doughy on the top.

The crust is topped with a liberal quantity of Italian style tomato sauce. This type of sauce is usually seasoned with herbs or and highly spiced. Typically there are no visible chunks of tomato in the crust. A layer of toppings is added, and finally a layer of mozzarella cheese.

Chicago style pizza has a rich and famous heritage and admirers from all over the world. If you’re a pizza lover and you’ve never tried this type of pizza, be sure to give it a try, I’m absolutely convinced that you will love it!

Tomatoes - The Worlds Most Popular Fruit

Surprisingly, the tomato is the world’s most popular fruit. And yes, just like the brinjal and the pumpkin, botanically speaking it is a fruit, not a vegetable. More than 60 million tons of tomatoes are produced per year, 16 million tons more than the second most popular fruit, the banana. Apples are the third most popular (36 million tons), then oranges (34 million tons) and watermelons (22 million tons).

Tomatoes were first cultivated in 700 AD by Aztecs and Incas. Explorers returning from Mexico introduced the tomato into Europe, where it was first mentioned in 1556. The French called it “the apple of love,” the Germans “the apple of paradise.”

Tomatoes are rich in vitamins A and C and fiber, and are cholesterol free. An average size tomato (148 gram, or 5 oz) boasts only 35 calories. Furthermore, new medical research suggests that the consumption of lycopene - the stuff that makes tomatoes red - may prevent cancer. Lycopene is part of the family of pigments called carotenoids, which are natural compounds that create the colours of fruits and vegetables. For example, beta carotene is the orange pigment in carrots. As with essential amino acids, they are not produced by the human body. Lycopene us the most powerful antioxidant in the carotenoid family and, with vitamins C and E, protect us from the free radicals that degrade many parts of the body.

The scientific term for the common tomato is lycopersicon lycopersicum, which mean “wolf peach.” It is a cousin of the eggplant, red pepper, ground cherry, potato, and the highly toxic belladonna, also known as the nightshade or solanaccae. There are more than 10,000 varieties of tomatoes.

Tomatoes are used in many food product, including, of course, tomato sauce (ketchup), pasta and pizza. According to a Steel Packing Council survey of 1997, 68% of chefs use canned tomatoes for convenience, quality and flavouring. It hasn’t changed much since.

While California is far and away the world’s largest producer of processed tomatoes, accounting for nearly half of the world’s total production, the “love apple” is also an international hit, being grown in such diverse nations as Italy, Argentina, Algeria, Taiwan, Australia and Chile.

California grows nine out of every 10 tomatoes processed in the U.S., with a crop value exceeding $547 million.

As hard as other states work to catch up, California’s prolific canners process more tomatoes in a few days than Ohio, the second largest producing state, processes during the entire season.

With California’s processed tomato tonnage skyrocketing from 3.3 million tons in 1970 to 10.75 million tons in 1994, California tomato acreage has more than doubled from 141,300 acres in 1970 to 311,000 in 1994.

Moist, dry, salty or sandy, the tomato can be grown in a surprising range of climates and in almost any soil. In California, tomatoes seem to grow EVERYWHERE–from the far northern portions of the state in Butte County clear to the Mexican border.

A virtual tomato seed smorgasbord, the Tomato Genetics Stock Center at the University of California, Davis has more than 2,750 genetic varieties of tomatoes.

California’s tomato season is in it’s peak from July through September when harvesters run 24 hours a day. The season, however, actually runs a full six months, beginning in June and running all the way through November.

The largest tomato on record is a 7-pound monster grown in Oklahoma.

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Ingredients:

* 2 pc. Pizza dough (see below)
* 1 teaspoon Virgin olive oil
* 2 cups Whole milk mozzarella cheese, grated (loosely packed)
* 1/2 cup Buffalo mozzarella, cubed into 1/2″ pieces (about 4 oz.)
* 1 Red bell pepper, roasted, peeled and sliced into 1/4″ strips
* 12 Kalamata olives
* 2 tablespoons Grated Parmesan cheese
* 2 ounces Gingrass Family Smoked Pepperoni, sliced very thinly (1/8″ or less)
* 2 tablespoons Chopped Italian parsley

Pizza Dough
* 4 cups All purpose flour
* 1 1/2 cup Warm water (about 90 F.)
* 1 teaspoon Salt
* 1 teaspoon Fresh yeast
* 1 1/2 teaspoon Honey
* 1 tablespoon Olive oil

Directions:

Pre-heat the oven to 500 F. and place a baking stone or tile in to heat.

Roll the dough into roughly 10 ” rounds using a pie pin or by pounding and stretching the dough.

Sprinkle a light cutting board or pizza peel with cornmeal or semolina and lay the dough down on it. Brush the olive oil over the center of the dough then spread the mozzarella cheese evenly over the dough, leaving a half-inch rim without cheese.

Arrange the cubed buffalo mozzarella, the olives and the roasted peppers over the cheese. Finally, slide the pizzas into the oven.

Bake for five minutes then remove from the oven and arrange the sliced pepperoni over the cheese and sprinkle the Parmesan over. Return to the over and continue to bake for five more minutes or until the edge of the crust becomes golden brown and the cheese bubbles in the center.

Remove from the oven and place on a cutting board. Sprinkle the chopped Italian parsley over and cut into six or eight pieces. Serve immediately. Pizza Dough makes dough for six pizzas Combine the salt, flour and honey in an electric mixer and mix using the dough hook to distribute evenly.

Add the water and yeast and mix for two minutes on low speed to bring the dough together. Increase the speed to medium and mix for six minutes, pushing the dough back into the mixing bowl if it creeps up the side. Add the olive oil and mix until the dough has absorbed to oil and comes back together. Turn out onto a lightly floured work surface and knead by hand to stiffen. Form into a ball and allow to rest for 30 minutes under a damp cloth. Scale into 4-1/2 oz. pieces then form into tight balls by rolling under your hand.