Pizza, how I love thee.

I love Pizza.
It was the first solid food I ever ate.
It is so versatile, and delicious.
I make pizza very frequently. Here is a recipe that I use all the time:

Crust

• 1 tablespoon sugar
• 2 teaspoons yeast
• 1 1/2 cups of warm to luke warm water

In a bowl combine the above ingredients. Let sit for 5 min. If it has bubbled, your yeast is good and is ready to mix in with the flour. If not toss it and get some new yeast.

• 3-4 cups of flour
• 3 tablespoons olive oil

In your mixer mix together the above ingredients. When the yeast mixture is ready add that and mix together until well blended. Then I change to my kneading attachment. I usually knead the bread for 3 to 5 min. I add more flour here if needed. You want your dough to be smooth and not tacky.

Then I spray a bowl with Pam and put a towel over the top and let the dough rise for about an hour or until the dough has doubled in size.
This will make about 2 medium to large pizza's.

While the dough rises I make sauce and cut up any vegetables and grate cheese.

Sauce

• 1 can tomato sauce
• 1 can tomato paste
• 1 to 1 1/2 tablespoons sugar (depends on how sweet you want the sauce)
• 2 teaspoons Italian seasoning
• salt and pepper to taste

I take a few liberties with the sauce. I add extra garlic and onion and sometimes more sugar. make sure you taste your sauce so you get it to where you want it to be. I like it a little on the sweet side. And feel free to add anything you want:)

Cheese

• 1 to 3 cups mozzarella cheese
• Parmesan cheese

Just depends on how cheesy you want your pizza. I put the Parmesan cheese on last.

Veggies

• 1/2 bell pepper
• small can pineapple
• small can olives
• 2 mushrooms
• 1 tomato

These are some veggies I like. You can put what ever you want on your pizza.

Butter for crust

• 1/2 a stick of butter
• 1 teaspoon garlic
• 1/4 teaspoon onion
• pinch of parsley
• salt and pepper to taste

Melt the butter in a pot. Turn off heat and add the ingredients. Mix together well.
I add chili seeds to give it a little heat.

Heat the oven to about 350 ( it is hard to tell what heat my oven is at ;)
roll out the dough to what ever size pizza you would like. Smooth on sauce, add a thin layer of cheese, add some veggies and add more cheese. When you are satisfied with the topping and cheese ratio sprinkle with Parmesan cheese. Then with a basting brush liberally apply the butter mixture to the crust. Make sure you leave some for the 2nd pizza! Put the pizza in the oven and let cook for about 15 min. Or until the crust is brown and the cheese on top begins to brown.
Take the pizza out of the oven and apply butter to the crust again. (this will help your crust be flavorful and keep it from getting to crunchy.)

The dough also makes really great bread sticks and cheesy bread sticks. If you are making bread sticks double the butter recipe. If you want them to be extra flavorful add some of the butter mixture to the bottom of the bread sticks too. If you do the cheesy bread sticks you will want to put the butter on before the cheese and also after the cheese.

If you want it to be a little healthier don't add the butter ;) And have lots of veggies!

Enjoy!