My time back in the kitchen has been inordinately devoted to pizza, and for this, I have to profusely thank Deb of Smitten Kitchen, one of my all-time favorite food bloggers. A few weeks ago she wrote a post outlining 10 ways to make pizza in the kitchen a bit less painful. And the two pizzas I’ve made in the last two weeks? They have been perfect, all thanks to the parchment paper.
Such a simple thing, really, I could kick myself for not thinking of it sooner. Forming the pizza on parchment paper makes it much, much easier to slide into the oven, without that maddening crust-folding, pizza-sticking frustration that caused countless tantrums in my kitchen. And it doesn’t diminish the pizza’s crust-crisping capabilities one bit! It is like my months upon months of experimentation and rage have been wiped away with one brush of Deb’s capable hands and smarty pants kitchen ways. I am so grateful.
For my first parchment paper attempt, I wasn’t feeling quite ready to use my own dough. I’ve just had so many dough-related disasters, and I was feeling far too emotionally fragile to deal with the potential for failure inherent in any dough making experience. I bought a bag of pre-made dough from Trader Joe’s. It was excellent: It was so easy to shape and it browned and crisped perfectly and was just the right amount of salty and chewy. How do they do it?
Caramelized onions and zucchini are definitely my new favorite pizza toppings. I always saute the zucchini before it goes on the pizza because otherwise it leaks water all over and ends up strangely dry and kind of rubbery. Not delicious. Caramelizing the onions is easy enough: I melt 1 tablespoon of butter and a bit of olive oil in a skillet, and add about half a yellow onion, sliced thinly. I cook the onion on really, really low heat for about 30 to 40 minutes, stirring and flipping the onions only once, about halfway through. And I add salt about halfway through, too, just a pinch. I’ve heard tell some people add sugar when caramelizing onions, but I feel like they get sweet enough on their own. Deb also recently featured a pizza with fresh ricotta and beautiful red onion marmalade. I will have to be trying this very soon.
At the last minute I decided to add manzanilla olives with pimentos to the zucchini and caramelized onions, and they were a great salty addition. And the parchment paper was my pizza savior.
Of course, once I discovered that there is a way to make pizza without anger, I have been all about it, and last night I finally felt I was ready to try a new dough recipe. I turned to Deb once again, as she seems to have figured out the answers that were eluding me. She has a simple pizza dough recipe that makes just enough for one small, thin crust. I mixed it up in the morning (and using the dough hook attachments on my hand mixer seemed to help the process along a lot, though I still had to knead by hand for a bit at the end). I let it sit in the refrigerator all day. I took it out to thaw about an hour before I made the pizza.
Once again, Deb did not steer me wrong. The dough was so easy to work with! I will probably use a bit more salt in the future, and I could have left it in the oven for another minute or so to really let the crust crisp a bit more, but finally, finally, I feel like I have a winner!
I topped this pizza with hot Italian sausage, sauteed portobello mushrooms, and caramelized onions, and sprinkled it with fresh basil once it came out of the oven. Deliciousness. I love pizza, and am eternally grateful to have finally discovered the secrets that have been eluding me all along. I suspect you’ll be seeing a lot more pizzas from me. Until, of course, the unbearable heat of Boston in the summer becomes so terrible that the very thought of turning on an oven is unthinkable.