Pizza and Professionalism all in a single post

So I hope to become more professional in the coming months with maintaining my blog and taking better pictures. I did not realize how much time it takes to get a good picture or prepare a background, but I can't really imagine myself ever setting up a background so we will see if my pictures can improve otherwise.

Anyways this is a vegan food blog, and I intend to show you some pictures of a few meals I had this week with my darling.

And as a precursor for the upcoming food of choice a little useless movie quote from some dudes who might like pizza as much as I do......

				Raphael:	A Jose Canseco bat? Tell me, you didn't pay money for this.
				Leonardo:	Awesome!
				Michaelangelo:	Righteous!
				Donatello:	Bossa nova!
				Michaelangelo:	Bossa nova?
				Donatello:	Chevy Nova?
				Michelangelo:	Wise man say, "forgiveness is divine, but never pay full price for late pizza."

PIZZA!!!!!!!!!

Ingredients

3 cups flour
1 1/2 cups warm water (95-100 F)
2 tsp yeast
2 tsp salt

2 tbsp olive oil
1/2 - 1 cup flour
cornmeal for dusting

Method

1. Mix together the first set of ingredients together in a non-reactive bowl (i.e. not metal). You just made a poolish. Let sit for at least 2 hours to ferment, or overnight in the fridge for best flavor.

2. Let poolish come back to room temp or work with it if it is already warm. Add flour to work surface and oil to dough. Knead in 1/2-1 cup flour until a slightly stiffer, yet still elastic and moist dough forms. You want it so that it does not stick to the board when no flour is on the board, but you want to maintain a high moisture content in your dough. This allows for really good bubbles to form.

3. After Kneading for about ten minutes form into a ball and let rise at room temp or in warm spot for an hour to an hour and a half. Mean while prepare your pizza toppings.

You may top your pizza with whatever vegan ingredients you can think of.....so many options...may i suggest Follow Your Heart Monterrey Jack, wild mushrooms, roasted red pepper walnut pesto, marinara, and zucchini. Good combo.

Anyways, you should have your ingredients ready for step 4.

4. Once dough has risen to about double in volume, punch down and begin to roll out into a pizza round while forming a crust. You can make this as thick or thin as you like, you will just have to adjust the baking time. I went for the pizza hut pan size thickness, not to thin, not to thick. Your oven should be preheated to 450-475 F by the way with a preheated pizza stone or baking tray. This give you the best crust texture.

5. Now you can sprinkle some cornmeal onto your pizza peel ( 0r cutting board in my case), place the pizza dough round onto the board, and top with ingredients. Make sure your pizza can slide on the board, which is why the cornmeal is there, so you can slip it off the peel/board and onto the hot cooking surface in your oven. It takes about 10 mins, or longer, then about 2 or 3 min in the broiler for proper vegan cheese melting.

Slice and enjoy.