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Part 3 - The Rest
Note the size of the chunk of dough
and the rolled out round below. It's not much dough for such a
large crust...it's rolled out very thin. Take care to flour the
rolling surface well or the dough will stick and bunch up instead of
rolling out. But, this dough is very resilient and can stand a
good, hard rolling.
Roll all the dough out at one time, as there won't be enough time during the assembly and baking process. This batch yielded 18 rounds of rolled out dough from the 5 cups of flour with which we began. Part 4 - Final Assembly and Baking During the time it took to roll out
18 crusts the oven and the cast iron griddles heated up. Take
them out one at a time. Be careful, they are extremely hot!
Pour olive oil in the middle of the pan...
...and swish around to fully coat the bottom and up the sides of the pan. Take a round of dough and place on
the hot oil in the pan. It will sizzle happily, indicating the
bottom of the dough is beginning to cook (and seal itself)
already. What we want is to render the dough as waterproof as
possible so it stays crisp and crunchy instead of wet and soggy.
Start tiling the cheese onto the
dough, pressing the blisters flat if necessary to achieve nearly
complete coverage. The cheese will start to melt right away
adding an additional waterproofing layer to the crust.
Now the base layer. You could
use sauce here instead of our tomato medley but it tends to be too
wet. Tile on the tomatoes just as you did the cheese. Note
that this is the reverse order of the way conventional pizzas are made.
Pile on the toppings in whatever
combo you prefer, or mix and match to suit the tastes of your
household. At PFI we alternate between lots of chili peppers and
jalapenos to none of either.
Here's a fully loaded pie ready for... ...a good spritzing of olive oil,
salt and pepper, then "pop" the pie into the oven. (We like to
say "pop it into the oven" as it tends to improve the final
flavor.) Establish a routine for assembling and popping into the
oven which should include the order in which each step is done and the
order in which the pans are popped into and removed from the
oven. You are going to be handling the hot, heavy pans and moving
quickly and it's easy to become discombobulated and get a nasty burn.
In less than 10 minutes the pies are
usually ready to come out of the oven. The pie will slip easily
in the pan and the exposed cheese should have begun to brown.
Slice into the traditional pattern of
two at right angles and two diagonally, then slip off the pan and onto
a plate...to serve, to freeze, whatever. When returning the pan
for another cycle, it's a good idea to wipe out the oily crud left in
the pan so it won't get a chance to stick.
And, here they are in all their variety. Up close... ...and personal. Postscript:
they reheat and freeze beautifully. To store, whether in the
refrigerator or freezer, just stack the pies in a heap with a piece of
waxed paper between layers. To reheat (after defrosting) put one
of the cast iron griddles on top of the stove with a little olive
oil. When hot, slap on a few slices until the tops heat through
and the crust is crispy. Too high and the crust will start to
smoke, too low and it will never crisp up.
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