Sicilian Pizza

Utterly delicious and pretty easy to make. The topping for this pizza is from Locatelli's lovely book Made in Sicily. The base I use here is a quicker one; his you have to wait overnight for, which I'm disappointingly never organised enough for. Making pizza definitely used to scare me a bit, but now I have made them lots, they are really as easy as people used to tell me they are... Just don't add cheese.

The Base:

  • 250g Strong White Bread Flour
  • 1 sachet fast action yeast
  • 5g Maldon Salt
  • 160ml Warm Water
  • 15ml rape seed or olive oil

The Sauce:

  • Tin Tomatoes
  • Garlic Clove

Topping:

  • Olives (9 – 12) chopped up
  • Anchovies (9 ish)
  • Finely Sliced Onion
  • Oregano

You need to get your dough ready a few hours before you want to eat…

The recipe for the dough is the same as for Nigel Slater’s Basic Bread, but with half the quantities – this makes 3 medium sized pizzas

Mix all your dough ingredients up in a bowl and then knead for 10 – 15 minute.  Cover the dough in a bowl and leave to rise for an hour somewhere warm.  When your hour is up, knead the dough again, put it back in the bowl somewhere warm and covered with a clean tea towel

Meanwhile make your tomato sauce… Fry a chopped clove of garlic gently until it starts to go a little golden (do not burn it); add a tin of tomatoes and simmer until a lot of the moisture has gone – it should be thick and delicious and there may not be as much as you think you need; but less tomato on pizzas is better if you want a crispy base

While this is cooking is a great time to get all your other pizza ingredients chopped and ready (again, less is more with pizza toppings).  Also sprinkle some flour onto some baking trays, ready for the bases and pre-heat your oven to 240˚c

Once your sauce is ready and your dough has done its thing; roll out your pizza bases.  I roll them on a dusted surface until they are the size of a side plate, and then I hold and flap them about a bit to get them as thin as possible and to get rid of all the excess flour before putting them on the baking tray

Add your sauce, then your other toppings (Olives, Anchovies and Onions)

In general getting two things right with pizza is really important – the base (which you’ve done) and the toppings (which you don’t want too many of otherwise it will be soggy)

Drizzle with a little olive oil, and pop in the oven for 11 minutes

These are really good with roasted tomato salad

 

 

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