Cook Together, Watch Alone

Like many other people out there I spent yesterday evening in the land of Lost, celebrating the end of six years of thoughtful, twisty, fun, and always engrossing storytelling. In the week preceding last night’s 4.5 hour extravaganza (including the pre-show), the blogosphere was ablaze with clever ideas for a Lost last supper—Smoked Lox, Shepard’s Pie, Jin and Tonics, etc. We chose to mark the occasion with homemade pizza (and by we, I mean me because Jason is not a Lost fan and while he watched a few snippets here and there and wanted to know how it all ended, I pretty much went this one alone which was fine by me).

While Jason may not have been all that enthralled by the show, he definitely enjoyed the pizza. One of the things I like so much about when we decide to make homemade pizza is that it is a truly collaborative process. I do the prep work while Jason is in charge of shaping the dough into individual rounds and we each get to top one just how we like it. This is the only meal I can think of that we always make together and, cramped apartment kitchen aside, it’s always fun.

We make pizza using a pizza stone but you can still make this dish without one. According to Smitten Kitchen, pizza baked at high heat on the bottom of a cookie sheet is pretty darn delicious (in fact the link provided there has lots of good tips from SK about making pizza at home—you should definitely check it out). But I have to say, pizza stones are a pretty cheap investment (assuming you don’t buy a defective one your first time around) and the results are delicious.

We kept our pizzas pretty simple last night—tomato sauce, fresh mozzarella, fresh basil and roasted red peppers. But the world is your oyster when it comes to making pizza so get creative (one of the best homemade pizzas I’ve ever had was one topped with an artichoke dip and shrimp courtesy of my friend Katy—decadent but oh so good). They key is making sure you have a clean oven and that you heat it and the pizza stone for at least 30 minutes before popping in your pie.

All in all it was a solid end to a good weekend. And, for the record, I was pretty satisfied by Lost’s uplifting conclusion.

Jason working his magic on the dough

 

 My pizza before....

 

And after

 

 Jason's pizza

Homemade Pizza with Roasted Red Pepper and Basil

Ingredients:
1 package of fresh Whole Foods pizza dough (next time around I am going to make my own so stay tuned for that but we decided to keep it easy last night)
1 can pizza sauce (we like Don Pepino brand and usually freeze what’s leftover for the next time around)
¼ cup freshly chopped basil
2 roasted red peppers, thinly sliced
6 ounces of fresh mozzarella, thinly sliced
Extra virgin olive oil
Salt and pepper
Cornmeal

1.Place pizza stone onto the middle rack of your oven. Preheat oven to 500 for at least 30 minutes.
2.Divide dough into two equal portions. Dust your workspace with cornmeal and work dough until you have thin rounds (or squares). We have tried both a rolling pin and our hands (see picture above) and would have to say the hands work better.
3.Move rounds to a cookie sheet that has been generously dusted with cornmeal.
4.Top pizza with a few spoonfuls of pizza sauce, mozzarella, red peppers, and basil. Drizzle with olive oil and sprinkle with salt and pepper.
5.Slide pizza off of the cookie sheet and onto the pizza stone. Bake for 9 minutes or until the crust is golden brown. To remove the pizza, we like to grab the crust with some tongs and slide it back onto the cookie sheet. Be sure to let the oven have time get back to temp before adding the second (or third or fourth) pizza.
6.Let stand for a couple minutes before slicing and enjoy!