If you're going to make money selling food, you've got to cater to the vegetarians, at least here on the West Coast you do. Not that that's a bad thing, not necessarily. I used this deviation from the carnivorous as an excuse to try a different base: basil pesto — seemed appropriate.
Prep time: about 45 mins.
Cooking time: 15 - 20 mins.
Est. servings: 4 - 5
Today's Specimen
Ingredients
- pre-requisite
- Enough dough to make one 17" pizza
- 2 tbsp. extra virgin olive oil
- ¼ cup basil pesto
- main
- 1 cup green bell pepper, diced
- 1½ cup portabella mushroom, diced
- 1 cup red onion, sliced julienne
- 1 cup tomato, diced
- 48 medium cloves garlic, roasted
- 1 cup feta cheese, crumbled
- cheese
- 1 lb. low-moisture mozzarella
- 4 oz. asiago (hard)
- 4 oz. pecorino romano
Directions
- Preheat the oven to 500ºF and make sure the rack you're going to use is in the middle or just a tad lower.
- Knead and roll out the dough on a clean, floured surface until it's thin and large enough a disc to just cover the pizza screen. Or hand-toss it if you've got mad dope skills. Optionally you can sprinkle some sesame seeds on the top of the dough and flip upside down.
- Place the dough on the screen and stretch it out just a little bit so you can roll the edges to the edge of the screen, just not too thick or uneven.
- With a basting brush evenly spread the olive oil on the dough, followed by an even layer of basil pesto spread by the back of a spoon.
- Add the feta cheese on top of the base, making sure it's evenly distributed.
- Add all the vegetable ingredients but the tomato, taking special pains to ensure the roasted garlic cloves are evenly spaced.
- Sprinkle the asiago and romano cheeses, making sure they're evenly mixed and cover the pizza uniformly. It helps to mix these two cheeses in a bowl or some kind of container beforehand.
- Sprinkle the mozzarella evenly on top, followed by the diced tomato as a garnish, again making sure there's even distribution and proper coverage to the inside of the rim of the pizza
- Place the pizza on the screen on the middle rack of the pre-heated oven, turning every five to seven minutes, for about fifteen minutes or until the crust is golden brown.
- Remove and transfer to a serving surface and allow to cool ten minutes before slicing and serving.
Next Time in the Lab
Not at all bad! But, not quite exotic enough, and I'm thinking this pizza can use a bit more garlic.
- Increase the roasted garlic coves to 64 (probably about two full medium bulbs — large cloves can be halved and small ones can count as half cloves).
- Substitute a cup of shaved delicato squash for the cup of bell pepper.
- Substitute ¾ cup shopped green onion for the cup of red onion.
