How to Pizza 🍕

 

Illustrated by Owen Lee

I love pizza. The sight of seeing melted cheese stretch as a slice of pizza is pulled away just drives me crazy. I used to order pizza delivery at my home when mom’s tired of cooking or when my friends come over at my home to hang out. Sad thing is that pizza + delivery is freaking expensive. In a world of inflation, I feel like my wage isn’t really following the upward scale (lol). Once every week, I crave for pizza. So, we cook one through a oven which is not the traditional way of cooking by the wood stove (so expensive to build one btw).

Since the stove can heat up to 900 degrees Celsius, and we don’t have a fancy stove, we would have to heat the oven to the highest temperature possible (for my oven it was 525 degrees Celsius). The type of pizza that I’m introducing is known as Neapolitan pizza. There is an actual certification of Neapolitan pizza (you must have wood stove which is a requirement). So, what I’m introducing is non-certified Neapolitan pizza (lol).

Here we go 👨🏻‍🔧🍄🐢

Ingredients:

·         400g of TIPOO flour

·         4g of yeast

·         8g of salt

·         240 ml of water

·         Tomato paste (you can make one or buy one: use the unsalted or low sodium one in a can, make sure you add some salt)

·         Mozzarella

·         Basil leaves

·         Olive oil

Steps:

1.      Heat 120 ml of water up to 30 degrees Celsius then mix it with yeast (8g) to activate the yeast.

2.      Mix 400 g of flour with 120ml of (not the yeast containing) water, 120ml of (yeast containing) water, and salt.

3.      Make it into a dough (add some small amount of olive oil) then rest the dough in a large container with a seal (has to be big container or else your pizza dough will overflow) at room temperature for 5 hours.

4.      Spread some flour onto your cutting board then remove your dough from the container. Add some on your hands so that the dough won’t stick onto your hands.

5.      Fold your dough in half and fold it again and again and again until you have a smooth surface.

6.      Cut the dough in half and make it into a small bun (round circle).

"It smells like beer."

7.      Stretch the dough into a flat round shape with bumpy crust on the outer layer of the circle.

8.      Spread your tomato paste onto the inner circle nor the outer layer.

9.      Add your mozzarella pieces and basil (oh and some olive oil too).

10. In you preheated oven (mine was 525 degrees Celsius highest temperature that I can go), bake your pizza for 10 to 15 minutes.

I didn’t have a fancy pizza cutter. So, I cut it with scissors.

Anyhow, enjoy your pizza! Share how the process went for you 😉

"dip your crust into balsamic and olive oil ;)"