Saturday, June 2, 2012

Pizza Dough, Wine and Body Paint

Make your own pizza parties are a regular occurrence here at KDP (see here).
I came across a new pizza dough recipe that claimed to be "no- knead, no-fuss".
That was kind of a lie.
To be fair, 4 glasses of wine tends to be my "this is too hard" threshold and that was greatly surpassed on this ladies night

No-Knead Pizza Dough from (Jim Lahey of Sullivan Street Bakery and pizza spot Co)
Makes six 10"-12" pizzas
Start at least 24 hours early!

7 1/2 c all purpose flour (plus more dough shaping)
4 tsp sea salt
1/2 tsp active dry yeast

-Whisk flour, salt and yeast in a medium bowl, with a wooden spoon.
-Add 3 cups of water, stir until well incorporated. Gently bring it together and form into a rough ball.
-Transfer to a large, clean bowl. Cover with plastic wrap and let the dough rise at room temperature (I use the oven) for 18-24 hours.

-Transfer dough to a floured surface, break apart into 6 even portions. Working with 1 at a time, mold into a ball and set aside. Repeat with the 5 other balls. Let the dough rest, covered with plastic or a damp towel for about an hour.
-Working with 1 ball at a time (and lots of flour, it's really sticky), gently shape into a round 10"-12" disc with hands.
-Put things on the pizza. Be creative.


-If using a pizza stone- place the stone on the oven rack, preheat oven to 500 degrees F. When oven is ready, turn to broil. Place pizza round on the stone. Broil pizza, rotating halfway through, for 5-7 mins, until the bottom of the crust is crisp and the top is blistered.
-If using baking sheet- preheat oven to 500 degrees F. Put the pizza's on the baking sheet, bake for about 10 mins, until bottom is crisp and top is blistered. 

I liked this dough, despite the planning ahead. It's very soft and doughy and had I had more patience, I might have rolled it out to the correct size, shape and thickness. These pizza's ended up being blobs of dough/bread with yummy stuff on top. Which is a first world problem. 

The Best Part
For this party, we had:
Peanut Sauce, Pesto, Tomato Sauce and Olive Oil
Onions, Black Olives, Green Olives, Mushrooms, Basil, Oregano, Sprouts, Carrots, Cilantro, Peanuts, Tomatoes, Sundried Tomatoes, Artichoke Hearts and Spinach
Mozzarella, Parmesan and Feta
Dessert Pizza- fruit and goat cheese


And about 10 bottles of wine (hence the progressively bad photos, the overcrowded kitchen and the pizza triangles). 





















Note: pizza toppings also make excellent hungover omelets for the next morning. 














I have vague memories of listening to Vertical Horizon and playing 10 fingers, neither of which are terribly blog worthy (sorry VH, you bring up too many awkward and emo flashbacks to 14 year old me). 
So I'm currently listening to Goyte's 2011 album, "Making Mirrors" 
I kind of love it, it's widely ranged and versatile. I go into the album expecting atmospheric, emotional easy listening, but am constantly side swiped by the 80s pop ballads. The album takes you on a journey and isn't 45 minutes of the same sound, which I find refreshing every once in a while. 



This is great. especially when you compare it to the following, from the same album:


Let's be honest here, sometimes the best break up songs don't send one running for the hammock, a PBR and Vic Chesnutt, Bon Iver and co. Sometimes you have to dance it out a little. 

Plus, I'm a little jealous of whoever had to do the body paint for the video. 

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