Bank Holiday Weekend and Spelt Pizza

Bank Holiday weekend seems ages ago now. It was amazing windows-open, sit-in-the-garden kind of weather. The hottest weekend so far this year. Friends came, I made the requisite mum's retro trifle they requested,  and  marinated tiny lamb chops and chicken legs in lemon juice, chilli, garlic and seasoning and a big bowl of tzatziki, Greek yoghurt with finely diced cucumber, garlic and onion. A's sister made sikh kebab with lamb and minced onion, and we all ate far too much with lovely Persian flat bread and leafy green salads. 

In-between I started a new knitting project, we watched The Station Agent and sneaked in lunch at a little Egyptian cafe. Perfectly succulent, mildly spiced chicken tagine with toasted almonds, warm bread and lots of fresh peppermint tea. 

And when 'A' was making his famous thin Italian style pizzas I asked him to make mine with spelt flour.  It worked amazingly well, wasn't too hard as I suspected it might be and I think tasted even better than the usual white flour. This is how he made them:

Italian style thin base spelt pizza.

Ingredients for two pizzas:

• 150g of spelt flour. I like Dove Farm organic spelt.

•  One tsp of dried yeast
•  A good pinch of fine sea salt
•  Warm water
•  A tiny bit of honey or brown sugar to feed the yeast...about half a teaspoonful.
• Two tablespoons of olive oil.

Topping:

• Tomato puree
• Olive oil
• One mozarella cheese per person
• Toppings of choice

Method:

1.Put the yeast and honey into a cup and cover with tepid water. Leave for about ten minutes to proof.

2.Place the flour and salt into a large baking bowl. Add the yeast mixture and  a little olive oil  and mix. Continue adding more tepid water until the dough feels nice and soft. Knead for about ten minutes.

3.Cover and leave somewhere warm until it doubles in size.

4.Heat up the oven to hot putting pizza stones in if you have them. Knock back the dough, divide into two halves and make into a ball then roll and stretch into a circle. Place onto a pizza baking pan. The ones with small holes in the base are really good for making a nice thin crisp pizza if you don't have a pizza stone. Reduce the heat to 200c and put the pizza into the oven to bake for about five or six minutes depending on size just to crisp up the base.

5. Meanwhile prepare the vegetables for topping by de-seeding and slicing finely.

6. Take a little of the tomato puree and mix with a drizzle of olive oil. Spread the pizzas with some of this mizture.

7. Break up one ball of mozarella cheese and cut or tear into chunks and place on the base.

8. Top with any slices of sausage, eg salami or chorizo or pepperoni, or smoked salmon.

9. Finally top with the vegetables, sweet pepper etc. and place on top.

10.  Return to the oven and bake for a further few minutes until the cheese has melted and the other ingredients heated through thoroughly.

Sharing weekends over at Amanda's, The Habit of Being.