Dinner tonight... Made-to-Order Pizza

Tonight I continued my mission to use up the supplies I'd gotten for our weekend in the country, so it was pizza night for the Fritzes. And I'm glad I did: with the right materials (in this case, Trader Joe's fresh pizza dough, pizza sauce, plus pepperoni, shredded mozzarella and pre-sliced baby portabella mushrooms), homemade pizza can make it from pan to table in about 10 minutes. Cannot beat that!


So that's our pizza above. Can you guess which half was mine versus which half was made especially for Mr. Fritz?* Pulling it together was super easy. First, I preheated the oven to 425. Then I did that Italian thing where you stretch the dough with your hands, twirling it in the air. (Okay, so I didn't toss it into the air, but I did stretch it out nicely before laying it down on the pan.). Next, I laid down a healthy coat of pizza sauce. Onto that went a light layer of mozzarella, followed by pepperoni, followed by more cheese, followed by mushrooms on half. I sprinkled powdered oregano over the whole thing, then slid it into the oven for 8 minutes. When the time was up, out came a luscious looking and tasting homemade pizza. Delish!

When I made this for our friends this past weekend, I let everyone choose which ingredients they wanted, and among the options was sliced artichoke hearts. Other items that would work well, I think: pesto, different cheeses, chicken, barbecue sauce, you name it. (Obviously having lots of different and unusual pizza toppings is neither new nor innovative, but just thought I'd throw those out there...) Tonight, I was mainly grateful that I was able to make a tasty meal with minimal effort and in very little time. Not to mention that the cost of the ingredients was far less than what we'd pay for a pie from Papa John's or Domino's. I'll definitely return to made-to-order pizza night in the future!

*If you guessed that Mr. Fritz went with the mushroom-free variety, you'd be correct!