What? You’ve never heard of my famous pizza before? Oh well, you have now. Today I made my special Italian-American style blend, with my own twist. What that really means is that the oven pan was too small to make the pizza dough thin enough for an Italian style pizza.

A history leason
Do you know the history of the Pizza? Originally it was made by poor Italians who used the left over flour from the bakers and made pizza-style meals on the remaining heat in the stone ovens. Or at least that is one of the stories. So Pizza is really the left over meal. They made a dough of the remaining flour and put what they had on it. Fish, squid, meat, vegetables, whatever.

My pizza

Homemade pizza

I know many people these days like to buy frozen pizzas or ready-made pizza dough and sauce. I make it all from scratch, because I like it better that way. It doesn’t take too long either, about an hour from start to finish.

Recipe
Dough (for 1-2 people):
- 3,5dl flour
- 1,5dl water
- 1/4 pack of yeast (norwegian package size)
- a little salt and olive oil

Sauce:
3 parts cut tomatoes
1 part Heinz ketchup
a little dash of olive oil
spice with oregano, basil, crushed black pepper, salt, onion and garlic

Topping:
Cheese
Oregano
Whatever you like

The dough
mix the yeast with lukewarm water. Add the olive oil, flour and salt. Mix and add flour or water as needed until it is ready for kneading. Knead the dough until you don’t see any cracks and it has a fine round shape. Let it to rise while you make the sauce and maybe wait a bit. It should be left for at least 30 minutes (preferably more).

The sauce
This is really easy. If you use hermetic cut tomatoes, just open the can and mix with the ketchup and olive oil. If you use fresh tomatoes you need to cut them first. Use a blender if you don’t want pieces in your sauce. Cut part of an onion into tiny pieces and fry them. When ready (light brown), add them to the sauce. Add one small garlic clove, lots of oregano, and a little basil. Blend in a touch of pepper and salt for extra taste.

If you use ground meat, you can fry this and add to your sauce if you like, or you could add it to your topping later.

Putting it all together
Roll the dough out by hand. Spread the sauce out so it covers everything but the edges of the dough. Add a thin layer of grated cheese. Add your favorite topping (I used fried ground meat, ham and red pepper). Add another thin layer of cheese. Cook in a pre-heated oven at 200C (400F) for about 10-15 minutes (can be even longer, depending on the size and the thickness). Enjoy, preferably with a coke.