Pizza Pesto Margherita

Pizza Pesto Margherita, which is homemade with fresh ingredients.

My homemade pizza crust recipe is thin, crispy on the outside and soft on the inside - my children's favourite way to eat it.

Homemade pizza crust may sound difficult to you. Why waste time when you can buy frozen? But trust me homemade crust tastes far more better than store brought ones or even restaurant ones.
Always making pizza at home is fun and especially with children.

Flour - For best results, I suggest you to use this traditional Italian pizza flour Type 00. You can find it any Italian supermarket, if not you can go with all purpose flour.

Sauce - Making sauce will be quick and easy by using pasta sauce as base or specially made pizza sauce which are available in stores.

Pesto - pesto is basically Italian sauce and there are two kinds of sauces Green pesto and Red pesto. Red pesto is made with sun dried tomatoes, parmesan cheese, pine nuts, garlic and olive oil. Green pesto is made with fresh basil leaves, parmesan cheese, pine nuts, garlic, and olive oil. In this recipe we have used green pesto and this easy and beautiful pesto is absolutely bursting with herby flavour.

Customised Pizza - Making your own customised pizza by satisfying everyone in the house by making two different flavours in one pizza like making half pizza as vegetable pizza and other half as Margherita pizza as shown in the picture or as you like.

Cheery Tomato Pizza - Top your pizza with two of your favourite cheeses and topped with sliced cherry tomatoes.

Homemade Pizza Recipe:

Prep Time: 20mins
Waiting time: 1hr/more
Cooking Time: 8mins/approx
Yield: 2 Pizzas/3-4 persons

Ingredients:

YEAST+ DOUGH:

Pizza flour/All purpose flour - 250g
Instant yeast - 6g
Salt - 1/2tsp
Sugar - 1/2tsp
Extra virgin olive oil - 1tsp+2tbsp
Lukewarm water - 40ml+100ml
Flour for dusting - 2tbsp

Pizza SAUCE:

Tomato basil pasta sauce - 10tbsp
Garlic  - 1pod(grated)
Salt - 1/3tsp
Olive oil - 1/3tsp

Pizza CHEESE & Topping

Fresh Mozzarella - 100g
Cheddar cheese - 100
Green pesto - 2tsp

Method:

Making YEAST Mixture:

-Take 40ml of lukewarm water in a bowl along with salt+sugar+yeast, mix it with fork and leave for few minutes.

Making DOUGH:

-Put the flour in a big bowl,make a well in the centre and add olive oil.

-Now add the yeast mixture to the well which is resting.

-Once all of the ingredients are mixed, Knead for 7 minutes by hand or with your dough hook on low-medium speed. If your dough is too wet, add up to 1/4 cup more flour. Drizzle some more olive oil and make it like a chapati dough by kneading the dough  rolling it backward and forward repeat  this for 2mins. After kneading, your dough should be smooth and elastic. Poke it with your finger - if it slowly bounces back, your dough is ready to rise. If not, keep kneading.

-Grease the bowl+dough with some more olive oil and cover it with clingfilm.

-Rest the dough in a warmest place in your house.I kept the bowl in oven for good results.
-Rest it for 40mins to 1hour or until it is double in size.

Making SAUCE:

-Take all the ingredients to a bowl,mix well and keep it aside.

Cheese:

-I used two kinds of cheeses, grate both the cheeses separately  and keep it aside.

Pre-heat the OVEN:

-It is very important to preheat the oven for 15 mins @ maximum temperature given on the oven.

Making PIZZA:

-Make sure you switch on the oven to preheat  by now as we will be ready to bake the pizza in 15 mins.

- Take out the dough on a dusted surface, punch the dough down to release the air.
-Divide the dough in two. Put one half  back in a bowl and cover it with clingfilm for another pizza.

-Take a piece of the dough,dust your surface and dough with a little flour,and roll it out(just like a thin chapati) into a rough circle about 0.5cm thick.

-Now take the circle onto a pizza tray/baking tray(if you are using baking tray ,i suggest you to use parchment paper/baking sheet.Place the circle on parchment paper and rest of the procedure is same).

-Brush the pizza circle with little olive oil and spread the pizza sauce as shown in the picture.

-Sprinkle 50g of grated mozzarella + 20g of cheddar cheese.

-Now add green pesto, keep it simple and don't overload it with pesto, just like sprinkle. Add left over 30g cheddar cheese and ready to bake.

-Bake it at maximum temp for 7mins 30sec(7:30 baking time) or until the pizza is golden and crispy.
-Take out the pizza and cut it into slices by using pizza cutter and enjoy eating them with your loved ones.

LEAVE A COMMENT,SHARE THE RECIPE & SPREAD THE JOY OF COOKING!