Pepperoni Pizza

Ingredients
(Serves 4)

Dough

• 500 g All purpose flour (unbleached)
• 16 g Kosher or Sea Salt
• 1 g Instant Dry Yeast
• 350 g Water

Sauce

• 1 can (796ml) of whole or diced tomatoes (no salt added) Kosher or Sea Salt to taste
• 6 tbsp of Extra Virgin Olive Oil
• 1 tsp of White Sugar
• 1 tsp of MSG

Toppings

• Shredded Marble Cheddar
• Pepperoni (Ones with natural casing preferred, if not any pepperoni you like will do)
  

Making Your Dough

1. In a suitable bowl, mix in the flour, salt, and yeast.
2. Slowly add in water, with a wooden spoon and start mixing all the ingredients to combine. Mix until the consistency of your dough starts to look ‘shaggy’. Then let it rest for 15-20 minutes.
3. At this point, lightly oil your hands and pick up your loosely formed mass of dough. Then as best as you can, fold your dough 4 times into itself. Place the dough (seam side down) into your mixing bowl and cover tightly with plastic wrap.
4. Leave your covered dough to sit for 24 hours at room temperature. It should double in size and you’ll see bubbles start to form.
   On a lightly floured cutting board or counter top, start dividing your dough into 4 equal portions. I usually do this with a knife or kitchen scissors.
5. Lightly oil your hands and pick up each dough portion and start tucking it into itself 4 times (top to bottom, side to side). This will form your dough balls.
6. Place your dough balls into lightly oiled plastic food containers, and place them in the fridge for 48 hours. If you don’t have containers, Ziploc bags will also work.
7. Remove dough from fridge at least
   1 hour before using. This allows the dough to come to room temperature, and makes it easier to work with.
   

Making Your Sauce

1. Open your can of tomatoes and drain the juice.
2. Place drained tomatoes into a cylindrical container.
3. Add salt, sugar, MSG and the olive oil.
4. Slowly stir and taste. Make adjustments according to your taste.
5. When you’re happy with your sauce, start blending with your hand mixer or an immersion blender.
   Alternatively, you can pulse in a blender like a Vita mix.
6. Blend until consistency is smooth. Now it’s ready to use.
   

Baking Your Pizza

For this pizza, set the oven to 450º and let it preheat for at least an hour. While the oven is preheating, oil your cake pan with olive oil.
Place your dough ball into your pan. Oil your fingers, and in a gentle but firm manner, start dimpling your dough out towards the edge of the pan, using just your fingertips. If the dough starts retracting from edge, wait 5 minutes before you start dimpling again.

Once your dough is shaped the way you want it, sauce your pie right to the edge, sprinkle cheese right to the edge, and lastly add your pepperoni right to the edge.

Place your pie into your oven and bake for 10-12 minutes.

Once your pizza is done and out the oven, let it cool for 2 minutes before removing from the pan. Use a small spatula to remove the pizza by gently sliding it out onto a cutting board. It should slide out rather easily because of the nicely oiled pans. These pies will be airy, thin, and chewy. The sauce and cheese to the edge will give you a nice salty cheese crust. The bottom should be golden brown and crispy. Enjoy!

Side Note: I like to pair this pizza with an ice cold Coca-Cola. To me it complements in a way that beer or wine can’t.