Margherita Pizza

Italian Entree

MARGHERITA PIZZA

INGREDIENTS

PIZZA CRUST (If you have a bread maker)

3 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup water
2 1/2 tablespoons vegetable oil
3/4 teaspoon sugar
3/4 teaspoon salt
2 1/2 teaspoons active dry yeast
no-stick cooking spray

TOPPING

3 garlic cloves
1/4 cup olive oil
2 Roma tomatoes
2 ripe red tomatoes
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
8 ounces Mozzarella cheese
1/2 cup Parmesan cheese
1 teaspoon basil
1 teaspoon oregano
1/2 teaspoon pepper
1 teaspoon thyme

UTENSILS

1 16-inch pizza dish or 2 12-inch dishes
bread machine
no-stick spray

PREPARATION.

Measure out the flour and set aside. Pour the water into the bread maker. If you measure the water before the flour, the flour will stick to the sides of the measuring cup. Egads!

Add oil, sugar, salt, and yeast to the bread maker. Do not put the yeast directly on top of the salt. Salt is bad for yeast and yeast makes the dough rise. (I debated putting a comment here, but decided not to.)

Set the timer or the menu on the bread maker to “Dough.” Wait the required time, probably a bit more than an hour. In the meantime liberally spray the pizza pan with no-stick spray. This will prevent the crust from forming a glue-like bond with the pan.

While bread making is whizzing away, mince garlic cloves. Slice Roma tomatoes and ripe red tomatoes. Put garlic, olive oil, and sea salt. Mix with whisk. Coat all tomato slices in mixture and set aside.

Take the dough out of the bread maker and roll it out until the dough covers the pizza pan. If you do not possess a rolling pin, any canned food can will do as long as it is at least 6 inches tall. It is best to spray the can or coat it with a thin layer of flour before spreading the dough.

After rolling, let the dough sit and rise for 30-to-60 minutes. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Coat pizza crust with garlic/tomato mix. Put Roma tomato and ripe red tomatoes slices evenly on pizza crust.

Mix Mozzarella cheese, Parmesan cheese, basil, oregano, pepper, and thyme in small mixing bowl. Sprinkle cheese/spice mixture evenly on pizza crust.

Bake pizza in oven at 400 degrees for 10 to 15 minutes or until cheese is golden brown.
TIDBITS

1) This margherita is a pizza. Eating it will not get you drunk or even give you a buzz. Jimmy Buffet was not “wasting away in Margheritaville.”

2) Okay, you could assemble the sugar and the other ingredients that go in the bread machine and let them ferment until you get alcohol. But I suspect you’d only get a sour tasting alcoholic glob.

3) Margherita Pizza was named after the Queen of Naples sometime ago.

4) It’s difficult to remember to type in that “h” in “Margherita.” My spell checker doesn’t like it either. Why, why couldn’t that queen have been named something easy such as, “Maria” or “Sophia?”

5) My two sons have simple names just in case they create a world-famous pizza.

6) Italy was unified during the years 1860 to 1870. This event, thank goodness, put an end to Neapolitan queens bestowing their weirdly spelled names on perfectly good pizzas.

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef

My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.