Pizza dough ingredients:
¾ cup of warm water
1 ½ teaspoons sugar
1 sachet of active dry yeast
2 cups of all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon of olive oil
generous pinch of salt
Directions:
In a bowl combine water, sugar, and yeast. Stir and then set aside for a few minutes.
Attach a dough hook to your stand mixer.
In the bowl of the stand mixer, add the flour and salt and put it on medium speed.
Gently add the yeast mixture to the flour and follow with the olive oil.
Keep it on medium speed until the dough forms into a ball. This can take around 5 minutes.
Once the dough has formed, place it on a lightly floured surface and gently knead it.
Brush a large bowl with some olive oil and place the dough in the bowl and cover with plastic wrap.
Set it aside for about an hour or until the dough has doubled in size.
Place the dough back onto a floured surface and stretch it to your desired shape and size for a pizza.
Pizza topping ingredients:
2 garlic cloves
2 teaspoons of olive oil
1 can of whole tomatoes
Mozzarella cheese (sliced or shredded)
Fresh basil leaves
Pinch of salt
Cornmeal
Directions:
Preheat the oven to 260 degrees Celsius
Add the whole can of tomatoes, olive oil, garlic, and a large pinch of salt in a blender or food processor. Blend until smooth.
Dust your baking pan with some cornmeal and place your pizza dough on top. Adjust the size or shape as you like.
Generously spread the tomato sauce mixture onto the dough. Make sure to evenly coat the dough but leave a one-inch margin on the edge to create a border of plain dough.
Add your mozzarella cheese. Try to distribute it as evenly as you can.
Bake your pizza in the oven for around 10-12 minutes or until the crust has slightly browned.
Remove the pizza from the oven and add the basil leaves on top.
You may add a last drizzle of olive oil before serving.
Notes:
You may use store-bought pizza dough if you do not have the time or ingredients to create dough from scratch. Just keep an eye on it when it bakes in the oven since not all dough is created equally.
If you want to add a little heat, you may add red pepper flakes on top before serving the pizza.
If you are not able to use up all the tomato sauce mixture, you can store it in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to a week.
