Playing in the Kitchen: Pizza Dough

For this first installment of "Playing in the Kitchen", I have to talk about pizza.  We love making pizza over here, especially the part where you get to play with the dough.  Boodge and I have been making pizza together for a long time now and I've learned a thing or two.  It wasn't working to try to have him work on the "main" pizza with me--he pulled holes into the crust as I was spreading it and made "big pilo's" (piles) of cheese and pepperoni no matter how I explained sprinkling ("like snow falling from the sky").  Much better to give him a small piece of dough and let him have at 'er. He sometimes tries to roll it out, sometimes lets me do it, and then I take a portion of the prepared toppings and put it over within his reach, rather than letting him take whatever he wants.  But I do let him put on ridiculous amounts of some things he likes, like olives or cheese.  And I indulge the requests for bizarre ingredients like pretzels.  The last two pizza's he'd made, he's eaten in entirety over two days. He always asks me to make "pizza dough" with him.

Here's the recipe we use. It's for a 2 lb breadmaker, but maybe it would work without one.  I'm not sure what you would do with the yeast, though. Mom? Comments?  This recipe also looks good, if you don't have a breadmaker.

Pizza Dough

3/4 cup of fairly warm water
2 tbsp of olive oil
2 cups of flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon sugar
1 and 1/2 teaspoons yeast

Put the water and oil in the breadmaker first, then the dry ingredients with the yeast on top. Use your "dough" setting. 

You can double this recipe but if you do, only use 2 teaspoons of yeast.  This dough freezes well, just wrap it in plastic and stick it in, and it defrosts on the counter in a few hours.  Of course, you can also make pizza on pita breads, english muffins, and any kind of store-brought flatbread type thing and bypass the whole dough making thing.  But I think kids do really enjoy playing with the dough.  Mine sure does. 

After that I won't tell you what toppings to use....pizza should be creative, and we all have our favorites.  I'll say that I've been eating pizza with artichoke hearts and goat cheese lately, and loving it.  But you guys do your own thing.  Here are some pictures of Boodge's and my creations to inspire you.

 Pretzel Pizza

 Pilo Cheese Pizza

Pilo Cheese Pizza, After

 Sean and Katy Half and Half Special