Pete's-a-Pizza

Christine recently bought me Hamelman's Bread book, and I tried his recipe for pizza dough. It came out well; using a biga, or pre-ferment, for taste and texture is the secret. Next time I will probably add half whole wheat for health and flavor. I made two- the first was guanciale and shiitake, the second endive/basil pesto with cherry tomatoes. Given our oven's upper limit of 500˚, another important key to success is to get it nice and thin-right up to the edges of the peel- so it cooks quickly and gets good and crisp. The small effort required and the possibility of storing the dough in the fridge (or freezer) until needed mean that with a tiny bit of planning this can be a near-constant option. It does make me want to build a brick oven outside, though.