Those of us “of a certain age” have fond memories of the Kraft Pizza Kit. Mum used to make them for the mob of kids in my familly and I think I was 17 or 18 before I encountered “real” pizza.
In the years since, my tastes in pizza have evolved and developed. My personal favorite homemade pizza recipe is a bit complicated so I’ll save it for another day.
Let’s look at the basic kit instead.
The kit, as you may remember is a big bag, two small bags and a can. The instructions are all prominently displayed on the box.
The big bag goes into a bowl with some water. The instructions say to mix it up with some water and set it somewhere warm for 10 minutes. Don’t trust the instructions! They don’t add enough water to start with and mine didn’t start actually rising until 15 minutes. Once the yeast got going, it was active and energetic, so the dough was ready to work with after about 30-40 minutes.
Once it got going, mine rose really nicely and doubled in size really quickly. I dumped mine out onto my floured baking sheet, kneaded out the big bubbles, then rolled it out into one big pizza crust. The package says it’ll make 2 x 12 inch pies and I don’t doubt it.
I got mine close to the full size on the baking sheet then moved it onto a sheet of parchment paper, finished it up and slid it onto my pizza peel.
Once the pie crust is formed, it was time to dress it up. The can of sauce is about twice as big as it needs to be. There’s a serious amount of sauce! Uncooked, the sauce seems really sweet it cooks down to a less sweet flavour, but it doesn’t have as much of the spice in it that I would normally add.
I put pepperoni and salami on ours then added the first of the small envelopes – the spice envelope. It seems to be pretty much just oregano and basil. I added a bunch of grated mozzarella and the second envelope – grated parmesan cheese.
While I doing all of that, I preheated the oven and pizza stone up to 425f, like the box told me to do. ( Okay, the box said to use a cookie sheet, but come on? Really? I’ve got a stone right here…) I used the pizza peel to slide the pizza onto the stone. As always, the parchment paper earned its place in my cupboard.
The box says to bake your pie for 10-13 minutes. Don’t believe that either! Ours baked for almost 20 minutes before the crost was brown and beautiful.
I’ve got to say, at this point it smelled GREAT! I held myself back for a few minutes before I cut it so I didn’t end up with all the toppings and cheese all over the floor.
As you can see, there’s a lot of sauce there! It spurted up as I ran the wheel over it and made a glorious mess all over!
And here’s a slice!
So… How was it?
It was terrific! As a flashback and blast from our shared past, Annette and I both enjoyed it immensely!
Was it what I’d otherwise consider a “great pizza” ?
Well… Maybe not. Good? Absolutely! Great? Not quite…
But it’s a great starting point! If you’re just learning to cook or looking for a good shortcut to a quick and great tasting pie – this is an excellent starting point! Wanna kick this thing up a few notches? Here are some ideas:
- Add some salt to the dough! It’s okay but very bland. To my tastebuds, it cries out for salt!
- If you want to really add some flavour, throw in some basil, oregano and / or thyme when you add the salt.
- Mince some garlic and grate some onion into the sauce! Drop in some dried pepper flakes and give that stuff some legs! (Add some salt there, too!)
- I added a store-bought grated “pizza cheese” blend. Grate your own mix of cheeses that you like. Most mozzarella today is bland, nasty crap. Look for good mozzarella and add whatever you like! I add old cheddar, havarti, and gouda to mine. Is is authentic? Hell no! Does it taste good to us? Hell yeah!
- Crank up the heat and cook it quicker! My standard pizza recipe is done in 1 500F oven for eight minutes. High heat == crispy crust.
As always – play with your food!
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