Easy Recipe – Homemade Pizza and Calzones

See the newest pizza dough recipe I’ve been using below (it has a little molasses in it) – we all like it even better!

This first recipe, though, is the one I use for homemade calzones.  I double it so I can make extra to freeze (read how to do that easily in this post about a couple make-ahead meals that kids love).  See the soaked version below this first recipe, and also below are a variety of ideas for easy-to-make pizzas.  (This recipe came in the book with my Zojirushi bread maker, but I mostly now use my Bosch for making dough.)

Use the basic dough setting in the Zoj (or if you make it in the Bosch, knead about 8 minutes), add ingredients in this order:

• 1 1/2 c. warm water (filtered if possible)
• 2 t. yeast
• 2 T. soft butter (organic)
• 2 c. Bob’s Reds Mill flour (organic, unbleached, unbromated)
• 1 3/4 c. organic whole wheat flour (freshly ground if possible) or whole spelt flour, most nutritious: sprouted grain flour
  
• 2 T. honey (raw, organic)
• 1 1/2 t. sea salt

After the dough setting is done and beeps, split it in half and use buttered hands to spread each around two buttered, 15″ stainless steel pizza pans. Let set until a half hour before you want to eat.

In the meantime, prepare the other ingredients depending on what type of pizza you’re making:

• You can use traditional ingredients (I use Muir Glen organic pizza sauce and other organic ingredients I can find.) UPDATE: here is a homemade pizza sauce recipe!
• Sometimes I’ll make a bacon cheeseburger pizza: ketchup and mustard for the “sauce”, cooked hamburger (grass-fed beef, cooked with onions, salt & pepper), then sprinkle on bacon, lettuce, pickles, tomatoes & cheese.
• You could do a meatless pizza: brush on butter with garlic, then add various veggies and cheeses. We like parmesan and mozzarella with tomatoes, peppers, zucchini and Kent likes mushrooms, too.
• For a treat spread melted butter on the crust and sprinkle cinnamon & sugar, then bake until golden.
• Another one we like is using barbecue sauce instead of regular pizza sauce (I make my own barbecue sauce recipe lately since it’s super easy and most store-bought kinds have high fructose corn syrup and the organic ones we’ve tried aren’t great), then we put on ingredients like ham or canadian bacon, pineapple, green pepper, cheese.
• You could use this dough recipe (or the one below which I now like better) to make calzones and put ham & cheese inside, pizza ingredients or anything you’d like: flatten a big ball of dough on a lightly floured surface, spread ingredients in the middle, fold over and pinch sides together, brush with beaten egg and bake about 20 minutes or until golden.  (At right shows the ingredients I pulled out of the freezer to throw these together later in the day:  ham and 3-cheese calzones, yum!)

Always bake the crust 15 minutes or so (375*) before adding the ingredients on top (or it will be soggy), then bake another 15 minutes with the ingredients, until they are hot and the cheese is melted and starting to get lightly browned.

SOAKED VERSION

For the soaked version, start the night before and let set overnight, or I’ve even started it in the morning and let it set for 7 hours.  (Picture at right.) Again, I double this recipe:

• Mix together 2 1/4 c. hard whole wheat (or whole spelt) flour, 1/2 c. very warm water, and 1 c. yogurt, buttermilk, whey, or another acidic liquid.
• At least 7 hours later add in the rest of the ingredients (add the salt last, after you mix it for a little bit – the flour protects the yeast from the salt, which can kill it and you won’t get a rise):  2 t. yeast, 2 T. soft butter, 2 c. unbleached white flour, 2 T. honey, 1 1/2 t. sea salt.

Continue with recipe as noted above.

NOTE: Below is the recipe I’ve been using lately and we all love it!  A friend, Amy K., gave it to me – makes 2 thick pizza crusts, 3 medium crusts, or 4 thin crusts. Sometimes I’ll make different kinds like one meat-lovers, one with just cheese for the kids, and another maybe without sauce, and then I’ll brush on garlic butter, various veggies, and 3 kinds of cheeses, yum!

• 2 t. yeast
• 2 c. warm water
• 1/4 c. soft butter
• 1/8 c. molasses
• 1/4 c. honey
• 1 t. sea salt
• 5 cups whole wheat flour (I used 3 c. sprouted ww and 2 c. unbleached white)

Note:  this makes about 16-18 calzones (a little bigger than fist size, which rise to even bigger), so I double it so that we have enough leftover to freeze for quick snacks.

Soaked version:

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