Had a good pizza last night.

[Weekend_Sawyer]

 My two favorite pizza joints are gone. The Railroad Inn was a wonderful place, good food, service and the best pizza around. The owner always greeted you with a smile and handshake and a hope that you enjoy your meal. He looked just like Tip O'Neill. It is right by the tracks and the place vibrates and glasses tink when a train goes by. I found the place closed a couple of months ago. I hope he just retired. My second favorite place burned down a couple of years ago. It is alleged that the owners set the fire to get the insurance.

So I have been in need of pizza real bad. Someone told me about these Bobolis pizza shells and I decided to try them. They are real good. Here is how we had our pizza last night.

Ingredients:
3 links of Italian sausage
Handful of pepperoni
A thick slice of onion
Boboli shell
Pizza sauce, your choice.
Mozzarella cheese
Cheddar cheese

While the oven is heating to 475, I cut the sausage into small chunks and start browning it. I spread a couple of tablespoons of pizza sauce on my shell and when the sausage is done pat the grease off and spread on the shell. I throw a handful of pepperoni in the pan and fry it that gets out some of the grease and makes it crunchy, we like it that way. When it is done I put it on paper towels and pat it dry, sprinkle it on the shell. I chop my onion and pan fry it until it is translucent and spread on the pizza. Spread mozzarella cheese liberally over it and then a sprinkle of cheddar. Grind some pepper coarsely over it and in the oven for 8 minutes. Let stand for 5 minutes. Slice, sit, pray, attack.

Jon

[bedway]

My daughter and son in law own a pizza shop,,eat your heart out weekend_sawyer ,,bedway

[sawguy21]

 ;D ;D ;D ;D

[Weekend_Sawyer]

You aint that far away, might be seeing you! ;)

[Burlkraft]

Aaahhhhh good pizza...I remember it well   :-\  :-\  :-\

That pizza sounds awesome Jon  ;)  ;)  ;)

[Weekend_Sawyer]

 It was real good, and there are 2 slices leftover in the fridge
AND I get home before The Lovely Miss Celest today ;)

Life is good.

[jdtuttle]

Can't beat pizza. We like it so much we built a woodfired masonry pizza oven by our pond last year. You can cook a pizza in about 3 to 4 minutes. Something about fresh pizza!
jim

[Patty]

Your pizza sounds really good Jon. Makes me hungry just thinking about it.

Norm made a good one last week. It started out he was making tacos, but then discovered we were out of taco shells and lettuce  :-\  , so plan B was implemented. He kept the taco meat that was flavored with Charlie's Salsa, and other spices. Then he made a quick crust from bread flour, water, a bit of salt, sugar & yeast. While the crust was resting, he mixed up a tomato sauce with spices and slathered it on the crust, topped the sauce with taco meat, pancetta cheese slices, mozzarella cheese, and tomato-basil flavored chips. We could've gone without the chips, but they were a nice touch.

[DWM II]

DanG, Norm sounds like quite the improv chef.  ;)

[Pedalbiker]

Can't beat pizza. We like it so much we built a woodfired masonry pizza oven by our pond last year. You can cook a pizza in about 3 to 4 minutes. Something about fresh pizza!
jim

A woodfired oven has interested me for a while.  Can you describe yours and give me an idea of which plans you used to construct it? 

Thanks!

[estiers]

We like Buffalo chicken pizza.  cube up your chicken breasts and brown them on the stovetop.  In a pot, combine a small can of tomato sauce, 1 tbs margarine, and some Red Hot hot sauce (I use 4 tbs, but you can adjust for personal tastes) simmer to combine.  Then, spread sauce on crust, add chicken, top with mozzerella and bake.  After you pull it out of the oven, sprinkle on some bleu cheese crumbles and YUM!

[jdtuttle]

Pedalbiker, My pizza oven cost about 300.00 to build. I had some material laying around but the fire brick is a little costly. If you do a search on wood fired pizza ovens you will get lots of hits. There are sites that show how to build them. The one thing you have to be careful of is the formula for chamber size and door opening. It won't work properly if you get that wrong. My oven is by our pond near a small pavilion. It was a practice oven for me. We like it so much I'm drawing up plans for a summer kitchen by the house & a larger oven is part of that. Good luck & let me know if you need more specific info. jim

[Trax]

Good luck & let me know if you need more specific info

I would like more specific's if you don't mind We have a full size Bloddget Pizza oven at the house that makes great pizza's We have come up with some pretty good pies over the years. I have 1300 free red bricks and would like to build a wood fireed oven up to the lake.

[SwampDonkey]

I used to make my own pizza dough through experimenting. I never wrote anything down, or it's lost now, but it was good. I don't eat pizza too often now. But, it sure is a nice treat.  ;D

[jdtuttle]

Pizza ovens aren't just for pizza. I have cooked roast, bread & pretty much anything that goes in an oven. It always taste a little better too.
Trax, go to www.fornobravo.com on the left side towards the bottom click on the pompeii oven. It will take you to a set of plans to build an oven. They sell everything you need or if your like me it will give you enough information to build your own. A couple key things are make sure you use fire brick on the inside of the oven. Lots of insulation. And get the door opening fire chamber ratio correct. Good luck & let me know if you need anything else or how you make out building the oven. It's alot of work but it's worth it.
jim

[Norm]

Well thanks to jdtuttle I know what my summer project will be.  ;) I've been wanting a pizza oven outdoors and have been on the fence about how to proceed. After looking through the website posted I think it's within my skill level. You see while our house was being built I handed the brick to the mason when his helper didn't show up. He even let me mix mortar a couple of times so what else is there to know. :D

I also found some goodies listed on their store so tonight we're having genuine Italian products pizza.



Thanks for showing me that site jd but if you're not busy this summer I know where you can vacation. ;D

[jdtuttle]

Good for you Norm. One piece of advice on the height though. Make it about 5' to the cooking surface. Mine is about 3' and it's literally a pain in the back. I have to bend over or sit in a chair while cooking. A pizza takes about 3 minutes but when you cook 10 or 15 in a row you feel the affects. Good luck & enjoy. I'll try to figure out how to post some pictures and try not to get in trouble with Jeff.
jim

[Norm]

Thanks for the tip Jim, if you need any help with the picture posting let me know. It's hard the first couple of times but when you get the hang of it you'll be a picture posting fool.

I've been doodling plans for an outdoor kitchen and really want to have an outdoor pizza, bread oven as part of it. I may have to ask you a few questions when I get closer to the actual building if you don't mind. Thanks again for the website.

The pizza last night was delicious. The 00 flour really makes a nice dough and the San Martino tomatoes are great. I used shaved ham for one of the toppings and that was a nice change. My only problem was I ate so much that I woke in the night with a tummy ache. ;)

[M Williams]

Nothin like a good pizza pie !

My easy crust recipe

2 cups HOT water
4 cups flour
2 pouches of yeast
1 table spoon sugar
1 tea spoon salt

Dissolve yeast in water in a good size bowl, not sure of size but will hold a little more than a gallon, add sugar and salt and mix well. Mix in the flour with a forks till it balls up good. Knead on floured surface till smooth, about 5 minutes.

Put a few inches of hot water in the sink.
Put about a teaspoon of oil on dough and roll it around to cover in the bowl.

Cover bowl with plastic wrap and place in sink. I have a small sink so I cover the whole sink with a cutting board to hold the heat.

Let rise about an hour.  Punch down dough and roll it back up into a ball and add a little more oil to cover again and plop it back into the bowl in the sink. Let rise for 30 minutes.

Knead down again and divide into two pieces. Press onto heavily greased pans. I use the butter flavored crisco.

Makes two 11 x 14 crusts.

Makes great general purpose dough for some good bread of dinner rolls.

[Jeff]

I was goona take a picture of the chicken Pizzas I'm making for supper. One with the cheese on and one before I put the cheese on. But my battery is dead! :-\   I can take a picture when they come out of the oven, but you wont get to see all the goodies.

I Sauté the chicken mushrooms onions garlic and peppers all together in olive oil first. I make my own sauce with tomato sauce, pepper flakes, garlic, basil and onion. Spread the sauce on the Mamma Mary's original pre-made 12" Pizza crust, split the Sautéed toppings over the two pizza's then top that with a few sliced black olives, top with generous portions of Mozzarella cheese and bake in a preheated 400° oven on pizza stones for twenty minutes, or until the cheese is good and melted. I'll then pop each one into the broiler, watching them very carefully, to just slightly brown the cheese in places.

We have this pizza about once a week and both love it.  Its part of my diet and I eat it until I am full. ;D

I'll take a picture when they come out. Should have some juice in the battery by then.

[zopi]

just came in here to post the fornobravo link...there is an excellent neapolitan dough recipe on there,
and links for about everything...good stuff!

the same dough recipe makes great strombolis too...

[SwampDonkey]

I make my own dough now and raise it and such. I don't make my own sauce, I use little cans because it's convenient, but to buy and open a big bottle it would be a waste. I cook all my toppings in the fry pan except the peppers and mushrooms. I use hamburg and sausage. The sausage seems like it doesn't have the fat that some brands do. I add the onion in the fry pan and some garlic salt, sometimes I even like cumin in there and a dash of dill. I like all those little flavours floating around in there. :D I dash some chilli pepper on the sauce when it's spread to.

It's good stuff. I couldn't eat it every week, but maybe twice a month on a weekend. My grandfather loved pizza on Sundays. He looked forward to it. ;D

[Norm]

I could never make my sauce taste like the pizza joints until I bought the pizza seasoning mix from Penzey's. Makes it just right.

Uhhh Jeff I waited up all night waiting for the pizza pictures. ;D

[Jeff]

oops... :D

[Jeff]