Food - Homemade Healthy Pizzas Alfresco

May 28, 2015


Friday night pizza night has been one of our traditions since we first got together. If we're not going out then we'll make pizzas together from scratch. Normally Ben's been busy at work so I just cook dinner in the week but at the weekend it's so nice to make the time to cook together. Ben's in charge of the dough, I do the sauce and toppings. They always taste so much better than any shop bought pizza and are pretty healthy too {not healthy in your gluten free cauliflower base type of way but life is too short to eat pizza with a crust made from vegetables...}. Last Friday it was warm enough to sit outside for dinner so I set the table for us and lit some tea lights in the garden.



Recipe - Most of the time we make everything from scratch, even the dough so follow the recipe below. But last week we tried for the first time wholemeal frozen pizza dough from Waitrose, it was amazing and created the best stone baked like base. So if you're stuck for time then definitely worth trying. You just get it out the freezer the day before you want it, then roll it out, top and bake!


We prefer thinner, more tomatoey pizzas rather than the deep pan really cheesy ones.

Ingredients -{makes two good sized pizzas} 

for the base - about 300g of multigrain/seeded bread flour
- 1/2 sachet of yeast
- About a tablespoon of olive oil
- Pinch of Salt
- Tepid Water

for the sauce
- olive oil
- 1 small tin of tomato puree
- 1 tin of chopped tomatoes or carton of passatta
- 1/2 red onion, chopped
- clove of garlic, crushed
- fresh basil
- splash of balsamic vinegar

toppings
- You can put whatever you like on your pizzas. Our favourites are mozarella with red onion, mushrooms, courgettes, proscuitto ham and asparagus.

- To make the dough -
Mix the flour and yeast into a bowl then pour in some olive oil, the tiny bit of salt. Gradually add water and keep stirring until all combined. It's hard to say exactly how much water we use, but if it seems too sticky add a little more flour or too dry then add a bit more. It's all a guessing game but you can't really go wrong if you make sure it's all combined nicely. We're usually too hungry to wait for it to prove so roll it out to your chosen thickness, ours are normally 1 1/2cm thick. We use pizza trays with holes in to be best as they don't stick then pop into a preheated oven at the highest temperature for about 5 minutes before topping to help them rise a bit and stop everything going soggy.

- For the sauce -
Fry off the onion and garlic in a saucepan and add the basil. Then add the tomato puree and balsamic vinegar and stir until it just about starts to blacken. Then pour in your pasatta/chopped tomatoes and reduce the heat. Season and leave simmering until you need it.

- Then prepare your toppings and assemble. Cook for about 12 minutes on the highest heat your oven will go to until the cheese has turned golden and the toppings just crisp.



Yum, you can't beat fresh pizza! And there's nothing bad in this. What are your favourite toppings?

R <3 xx 

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1 comments

  1. Looks delish! My hubby makes pizza for the kids every weekend. Their weekend would be a Bust without it!!

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