Neapolitan Pizza
Since we moved to NDG our decent take out options were significantly limited and weekend consumption of pizza increased as a result. It’s easily the cheapest thing you can order when you’re too lazy to cook. To compensate for this trend, I’ve started preparing pizza dough on Thursday to have properly proofed in the refrigerator by Saturday when hunger strikes and I don’t feel like heating up a pan.
My usual pizza dough was always measured by eye and the results were never consistent. I have made pizza this way for years without bothering to change my habit until recently, when I set out to find a reliable recipe I could stick to that made the type of pizza I actually wanted to eat on a regular basis. Enter Peter Reinhart’s recipe for Neapolitan pizza dough, which is not only more enjoyable to eat but make.
This recipe schooled me in two things about bread that I never really paid attention to before. The first is that you don’t have to use warm water to make it. The recipe calls for water 18 degrees Celcius (65 degrees Fahrenheit), which is a bit cooler than room temperature and the results are great.
The second is that adding oil to the dough shortens the gluten strands, which makes it tender and flavorful but difficult to hand-knead to pass the “windowpane test” (where you pull the dough until its translucent enough to see through in order to determine the gluten strands have developed well).
I portion the dough, roll it into balls and coat it liberally with extra virgin olive oil, then place each ball into a sandwich bag. These individual dough balls can be frozen or left in the fridge for a couple of days and only improve in flavor. A six ounce ball rolls out to about an 8″ pizza and eight ounces about a 12″ pizza. I find baking pizzas larger than that is a mess without using a pan and things just aren’t the same if you’re not using a baking stone.
Speaking of baking stones, mine now has a large crack down the middle of it from thermal shock after mozzarella dripped onto it. Is there a way to prevent such a thing from occurring again?
- 22 1/2 ounces all purpose flour
- 1 tablespoon kosher salt
- 1 teaspoon instant (NOT dry active) yeast
- 1 3/4 cups plus 2 tablespoons room temperature water
- a few tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
- Combine the flour, salt and yeast in a large bowl. Make a well in the center and gradually incorporate the water. Stir together until it forms a rough ball, then set aside for five minutes.
- Lightly dust a work surface with flour and knead the dough, adding more flour as necessary, until it comes together to form a smooth, cohesive ball. Invert the bowl and cover it, leaving it to rest for half an hour.
- Weigh the total dough and divide it into equal portions according to how large you’d like your pizzas to be. Roll each portion into a ball.
- Coat sandwich bags with extra virgin olive oil and seal the dough balls individually inside. Place these in the refrigerator for at least 24 hours or up to 4 days.
- Remove the dough from the refrigerator two hours before you want to bake them. Coat them lightly in flour, dusting off the excess, then roll out as thinly as possible. Use the hottest oven temperature you can attain, with a baking stone or thick inverted baking sheet arranged in the bottom third of the oven.
For the simplest of Neapolitan pizzas, the Martguerita, spread crushed tomatoes onto a rolled out crust, portion fresh mozzarella or boccoccini on top and bake until the cheese has melted and the crust is puffed and golden. Allow to cool for a few minutes before slicing, so the cheese sets and the crust has a chance to rest. Dust with dried oregano and brush the crust with a cut clove of garlic, if desired.
Existential Crisis Adverted
Dear anonymous everybody;
The two questions I was asked the most while doing the different dinner project were, “That must be expensive!” and, “Oh, then how much weight have you gained?”
The implication that you cannot eat well on a budget has always irritated me. Therefore, my final undertaking for A Food Year will be to validate the hours I’ve invested here by creating an extensive food plan catering to cooking frugal and healthy dinners. Hopefully it will serve as a useful resource. I have no date slated for its completion.
I have food, so don’t worry.
Ken
Just kidding. Let’s be honest, there’s no way I could actually give up working on this website. It’s ingrained in the fabric of my life. Even this project I had planned as a send off would lead me back here to update it. A Food Year is my resource as much as it is yours. I’m not going anywhere. Existential crisis adverted until 2013.
Panforté (Siena Cake)
Forgive me for saying this, but as a Canadian that had never had panforté before I made it myself, the closest thing I can compare it to is an Eatmore, and, as a notice to anyone who has not tried this Italian version of fruitcake, this is also a wholly inaccurate comparison. However, the chewy, honey and chocolate nougat that suspends all of the ingredients together is not all that dissimilar in texture and few things are otherwise comparable.
This dessert is an amalgamation of all the little things I made an effort to do for Christmas this year. The candied orange zest, candied ginger and blanched nuts all come into play here to officially signal an end to my Christmas baking, into one delicious cake culminating all things Christmas but a warm fire and a glass of Brandy.
Like the European/North American fruitcake, there’s no definitive recipe for what to be included in a panforté, just spices, nuts and dried fruit of your favor. Figs and pine nuts might be more welcome and prominent here, but your usual candied fruit, pecans and currants are not out of place. Also like our fruitcake, the flavor of panforté tends to mature, so it’s best to make it ahead of time before you’re preparing to serve it to guests.
- 1 heaping tablespoon cocoa powder
- 2/3 cup (82.5g) all-purpose flour
- 3/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 3/4 teaspoon ground allspice
- 1/8 teaspoon ground cloves
- 1/8 teaspoon ground nutmeg
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 1 cup sliced almonds
- 1 cup hazelnuts, blanched and toasted
- 1 cup pecans, toasted
- 2 cups mixed dried fruit (apricots, figs, prunes, cranberries, currants and/or raisins), chopped
- 1/4 cup candied ginger, chopped
- 1/2 cup candied oranges, chopped
- 3/4 cup sugar
- 2/3 cup mild honey
- Preheat oven to 300 degrees with the rack positioned in the center.
- Grease the inside and bottom of a 9″ springform pan, then line it with parchment paper, grease it again and dust all greased portions with cocoa powder, shaking off any excess.
- In a large bowl, combine the cocoa powder, flour, spices, salt, nuts, dried and candied fruits and mix well. Set aside.
- In a large saucepan over medium heat, stir together the sugar and honey until dissolved. Then, continue to cook undisturbed until it registers 240 degrees (soft ball stage for sugar).
- Working quickly now, remove the pot from the heat and add all of the ingredients, mixing to ensure everything is adequately covered and no dry specks of flour and cocoa remain. Quickly scrape this into the prepared pan and, with a greased spoon or lightly wetted hands, press evenly into the mold so that it is flat and covers the surface area.
- Place the pan on a baking sheet and bake until the sides begin to puff up and the surface looks matte, about 45-50 minutes. Remove from the oven and cool completely before removing the spring coil, inverting and removing the parchment paper.
- Once cooled, wrap in wax paper and place in a sealed bag for a week for the flavors to mature, then/or dust lightly with powdered sugar and cut into thin slices.
Butter Tarts
I do not know of many desserts that are officially deemed “Canadian”, but butter tarts are definitely one of them. Sometimes you’ll find them made with corn syrup, a la pecan pie, to yield a softer, runnier filling, but I like them to bake up a bit firmer than that, lest I feel I’m just tapping a tree and pouring buttery syrup directly into my mouth. If something rings in at 300 calories a mouthful, I want to at least chew it and savor it a second.
As humble and ubiquitous as butter tarts are, you can quickly dress them up to be something really special. By substituting the almond and clementine-infused pastry from the Mince Pie recipe to line a tart shell, adding the zest of a lemon and orange to the filling, and substituting the raisins for chopped walnuts, you can have an exceptional tarte au sucre to serve with the fanciest meals. Dust with icing sugar or serve with candied oranges and slivered almonds for even more fancification (note: not a real word.)
I don’t think I’m going out on a limb here by saying that a butter tart is not a butter tart if the pastry and filling are not made with butter. Butter, real butter, makes all the difference here.
For the Pastry
- 1 1/4 cups (175 grams) all-purpose flour
- 1 tablespoon (15 grams) granulated white sugar
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 cup (113 grams) cold unsalted butter, diced
- SQ ice water
- Combine the flour, sugar and salt in a bowl, then cut in the diced butter with a fork or pastry blender until the mixture is crumbly and all the butter is covered with flour.
- Add the ice water with a fork, a tablespoon at a time, until you can press the dough together in your hand and it holds together instead of crumbling apart.
- Press the dough into a disk between plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least an hour before using.
For the Filling
- 1/3 cup (70 grams) unsalted butter, room temperature
- 1 cup (210 grams) light brown sugar
- 2 eggs
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1/4 cup half and half cream
- Place the butter and brown sugar in a large bowl and cream together with an electric mixer. Whisk in the eggs, one at a time, until the mixture is light and fluffy, then add the vanilla and cream.
Assembly
- 1/2 cup raisins
- flour, for dusting
- Preheat oven to 375 degrees with the rack positioned in the center.
- Lightly flour a work surface and roll out the pastry to 1/8″ thickness. Cut twelve circles with a fluted 4″ cutter and press into a twelve cup muffin tin. Chill in the freezer for a few minutes so that they do not shrink while baking.
- Place a scant portion of raisins in the bottom of each tart shell, then pour the prepared filling into each, coming almost to the top.
- Bake until the pastry has browned and the filling has puffed up, about 15-20 minutes, then remove from the oven and allow to cool. They will deflate, so don’t be concerned when it looks like you have overflowing domes of filling.
The original incarnation of this recipe can be found on Joy of Baking
Mince Pies
Gone are the days of being intimidated by pastry. It’s really not as finicky as everyone makes it out to be. In fact, it was actually worrying about it being so finicky that ever caused me any problems to begin with. Now I just press it all together with my bare hands, flatten it into a disk and I’m done with it. (By done with it, I mean ready to work with it, of course, since a flattened disk of unbaked pastry isn’t so appealing.)
This was the first year I made mincemeat from scratch and I wanted to utilize it in several ways, one of which is mince pies. Mincemeat Strudel is also on the menu. Who knows what else I’ll come up with. Anyway, in the interest of having leftover mincemeat after both of these recipes, I only made a half batch of mince pies and saved the remaining dough for a sort of tarte.
This crust goes the all butter route and has the addition of clementine zest and almonds to maximize flavor over flakiness. It also keeps it a bit more structurally sound, I think, which is useful when you’re packing them into tins for a while. If you want a flakier crust, substitute a quarter to half of the butter for lard or shortening, and nix the almonds in favor of pastry flour, and you’ll achieve what you’re after.
Just for my buddy Simon, I’ve included a quick recipe for hard sauce as well, because that’s how he likes it.
- 1 3/4 cup (225g) all-purpose flour, sifted
- 60g ground almonds
- 1/4 cup (60g) sugar
- 2 clementines, zested
- pinch of salt
- 1/2 cup (120g) unsalted butter, chilled and diced
- 1 egg yolk
- SQ ice water
- 250g (8.8 ounces) Mincemeat
- Combine the flour, almonds, sugar, clementine zest and salt in a large bowl. Cut the butter into the mixture using a fork or a pastry blender until all the butter is covered with flour and the mixture appears somewhat mealy.
- Stir in the egg yolk and a teaspoon of ice water, then grab it with your hands. If the dough holds together instead of crumbling apart, you’re good to go. Otherwise, add an additional teaspoon of ice water, mixing it in with your fingers, until you can press the dough into a cohesive mass and it does not fall apart.
- Divide the dough into two and press each into a disk between sheets of plastic wrap. Refrigerate for at least an hour to thoroughly chill.
- After an hour, preheat your oven to 400 degrees with the rack positioned in the center.
- Lightly dust a work surface and roll out one of the pastry disks to approximately 1/8″ thickness. Cut out twelve 3″ circles from the dough and lightly press into a shallow muffin tin.
- Roll the remaining pastry out to 1/8″ thickness as well and cut out twelve 3″ circles with a fluted cutter for the lids.
- Divide the mincemeat between the twelve tarts, then lightly press each pastry lid onto the top of each. Brush with a beaten egg and sprinkle with sugar, if you wish, then cut two slits into the top to allow steam to escape.
- Bake until golden brown, about 12-15 minutes, then remove from the oven and allow to cool slightly before removing from the tin and cooling completely on a wire rack.
- Dust the cooled mince pies with icing sugar and eat as is, or serve warmed with hard sauce.
To make hard sauce (which is basically alcohol-infused icing), cream together 1 stick of room temperature unsalted butter with 1 1/2 cups of icing sugar and an ounce of brandy, rum or whiskey.
This pastry recipe is adapted from BBC Food.