Pizza Night is a big deal in our house. And you can buy dough at Trader Joe’s or your supermarket, and it’s just fine. But why settle for just fine, when making great pizza dough is so easy to do! And when people ask if you made the dough yourself, you calmly answer, ‘Why yes I did.” It feels good.
You need at least 90 minutes of time, and preferably two hours, but 90% of that time is waiting for it to rise. Try it out!
Ingredients
4 cups White FlourIf you want to get fancy, you can use the Italian 00 flour, which is much softer and will impress your friends who know pizza. I like to substitute 1/2 cup whole wheat flour, as I think it gives the dough some nice rustic appeal.
2 tsp Kosher Salt
1.50 tbsp Active Dry Yeast(Equivalent to two packages)
1.25 cups Warm Water
1 tbsp Olive Oil
Tomato/Pesto/BBQ SauceYou choose!
Mozzarella and Parmesan Cheese
Awesome Pizza Ingredients
Directions
Mix Warm Water with yeast. Let sit for 5-10 minutes until bubbly.
Mix Flour and Salt.
In a Kitchen Aid Mixer, or with a spoon or with your clean hands, mix, then knead the flour with the yeasted water. Do this for 5 minutes in the mixer or at least 7 minutes by hand. I prefer kneading it, as my hands can feel the dough when it starts to soften up and become more pliable. Knead it for another minute after you feel that change, and you’re good.
Separate into two or three dough balls. Two makes two 12-inch pizzas. Three makes three 8-10 inch pizzas.
Let rise for at least one or two hours. Some ovens have a “proofing” mode, where you can set the temperature to 90 degrees or so. Otherwise, just cover with a cloth in the warmest place in your kitchen and let rise. It should double in size.
About an hour before you are ready to start putting those pies in the oven or Big Green Egg, start the oven at 550 (or as hot as yours will go) and put the pizza stones in there. If you have multiple pizza stones, they work great on the different levels of the oven. Also, if you have a convection oven, that works best.
I’m working on using my gas grill too, and I hope to update you on that soon.
Start in the middle and press out until you have a nice circle, or something that approximates a circle, or some kind of amoeba-like crust that will taste wonderful. 1/4 of an inch is a good thickness target – as that allows some rise an those nice bubbles in the oven. If you want it super thin, roll out with rolling pin to about 1/8″. Or, if you’re really good (I’m not) toss it and make it the artistic way!
Cover with your favorite sauce, cheese, and toppings (keep it light – pizza is not meant to be overloaded) ingredients, bake at 550 degrees ((or the highest your oven will go) on a pizza stone for 6-8 minutes, and you are ready!
One more note – there is always a debate about how to keep pizza dough from sticking to the stone. Cornmeal is a favorite answer, but it’s not my answer. Parchment paper. After you roll out the dough, put it on parchment paper and then add the ingredients. When you are ready to bake, slide the pizza WITH THE PARCHMENT PAPER STILL ON THE BOTTOM, into the oven. I take out the parchment paper after 2-3 minutes, it will be brown on the edges, and then the pie loses its stickiness and can be easily moved around on and eventually removed from the stone.
In December of 2018, Jill, Dawson, and I took a big trip to Cambodia. Jill’s sister was living there at the time, and we took the opportunity visit their family, and travel with them around Cambodia. It was amazing! The sites, the brutal and beautiful history, and the food all made an impact.
My favorite foods there were Crab Fried Rice, Fish Amok, and Kep Fish. This mild Cambodian curry dish is a my combination of Fish Amok and Kep Fish, except that there is no fish. You choose what to serve it with – fish, shrimp, tofu, and chicken all work well. Serve over jasmine rice and you have a full one-dish meal!
Ingredients
3 tbsp Yellow Curry Paste
2 Cans, Coconut Milk
1 Sweet Onion, Diced
2 Red Bell Peppers, Diced
2 Green Bell Peppers, Diced
1 Bunch of Celery, Diced
1 tbsp Tamari or Fish Sauce*(Add more to bring out more umami taste)
Salt and Pepper
1 tbsp Corn Starch
4 Cloves, Garlic, Minced
2 cups Vegetable Broth
Directions
Sauté onions, garlic, and celery in a little vegetable or olive oil.
Add bell peppers, and sauté until a little softened.
In a separate pot, heat 1 Tbsp Olive Oil, mix in curry paste.
Mix in coconut milk with a whisk.
Taste for spice. You can add curry paste, red chili pepper flakes, or chili garlic sauce if you want more heat. Add vegetable broth and re-taste for heat.
In a separate bowl, mix a small amount of the curry with the cornstarch. Mix back into the curry to thicken.
Add vegetable mixture to curry sauce.
We love this recipe and the roasted garlic sauce one too. Sometimes for a larger crowd we will make both sauces and it feels like we’re at a restaurant, where our guests can choose one or the other.
The recipe is from the Hot Wok cookbook by Hugh Carpenter and Teri Sanderson. The crispy tofu comes from Honga Im Hopwood’s cookbook.
Ingredients
Sauce Ingedients
1 tsp Tangerine Zest (Orange works too!)
⅓ cup Tangerine or Orange Juice (Use the fruit you zested)
¼ cup Rice Wine (or dry sherry)
2 tbsp Oyster Sauce
1 tbsp Hoison Sauce
1 tbsp Sesame Oil
2 tsp Chile Garlic Sauce
2 tsp Cornstarch
1 tsp Ground Black Pepper
RIce
1 cup Rice
Protein and Veggies
0.50 lb Tofu, Chicken Breast, Meat (Leftovers are great here!)
2 Veggies of your choice (Carrots, Spinach, Broccoli, Cauliflower, Green Beans, Snap Peas, etc.)
Directions
Preparing the Sauce
Mix all of the sauce ingredients together. Set aside or refrigerate for 2-3 days
Cooking the Rice
Make the rice the way you make rice – Rice cooker, stove top, microwave – I don’t judge. I make rice on the stove top using the recipe for Sheri’s Spanish Rice. For Asian foods, I take out the taco sauce and keep the rest of the recipe the same.
Preparing the Veggies and Protein
If you’re making tofu – make it crisp. Take 3/4 cup cornstarch and mix in 2 Tbsp of Black Pepper. Cut the tofu into cubes, Dry with paper towels. Roll it in the cornstarch and sauté in vegetable/canola oil until crisp on all sides. It’s super tasty!
Otherwise, cook a chicken breast or sirloin steak and slice.
Rotisserie chicken is spectacular here.
Leftovers are awesome too!
Choose your veggies and sauté until you like them. I add 1/2 tsp salt and 1/2 tsp pepper (maybe more salt to taste).
Final Preparation
Prepare all of your ingredients – your sauce, your prepared protein, and your prepared veggies.
Add the sauce to a sauce pan, heat until serving temperature. Add the protein and veggies, stir to heat and coat.
Prepare a bowl/plate with the rice in it. Ladle your creation on top and serve!
I had been eyeing the Tomahawk Steaks at our local grocery store for sometime. They were the showcase feature of the butcher’s display case. A few years ago (when Dawson was just 14), I decided it was time and invited our friends Steve and Karen – great cooks themselves – over to enjoy. Steve, who burns about 17,000 calories a day biking all over the Santa Monica Mountains, thinks that one of these is just about a perfect serving size!
These super big and super thick steaks are quite a show and really fun to cook, serve, and eat! Cooked low and slow, then seared at the end, they are super tender and just amazing.
Ingredients
1 Tomahawk Ribeye Steaks – With the bone, they weigh about 3 pounds. Serves 2 to 3.
Soy Sauce
Montreal Steak Seasoning
Directions
You may need to ask your butcher for these. These were choice grade (fantastic), and I got them from Pavilions. I have heard they can be found sometimes at Costco.
Try to stop your son from playing with the food. Another parenting failure on my part.
I only use two seasonings on steak: soy sauce and Montreal Steak Seasoning. I went heavy on the Montreal. Please let this sit with the spices for at least 30 minutes. You can go up to 12 hours. Letting the salt do its magic is worth the time.
The key with these steaks is that they are almost roasts. They are almost 3″ thick. I think the best way to cook them is to use low, indirect heat (250 degrees) for an hour or so until they reach the desired temp. Then sear them to get a crust and make them look beautiful. My indirect heat source is our course my Big Green Egg, but Traegers are wonderful too. If you are using the cool side of the grill, make sure to rotate the steak every 20 minutes or so.
I am using my new Thermopro probes in there to monitor the temp. I’ll take them off when they hit 128.
I used a small amount of pecan wood for a hint of smoke flavor. Don’t over do it!
Turn them over once during the cook.
Take them out of the Big Green Egg/Oven when they hit your desired temp, and let sit for 10 minutes.
Prepare a high heat grill, and sear each side for 1 to 2 minutes. You’re just looking for a beautiful seared finish here. Turn the steaks 90 degrees halfway through to cross hatch it.
Plate it up!
Serve it up!
