The clock strikes 7 pm each day with a
hunger bell in our tummies. Fixing a quick evening snack means bread n
butter sandwich, 2-minute noodles or the street side pani puri. But there are
special evenings when I get special requests from my ever hungry cousin Clement
(incidentally just like me- ever hungry) and my grandmother who has a very
modern palette! She loves burgers, pasta, pizza and alike. So this Cheesy pizza kept us busy and tummy full on a
Saturday evening with no room for dinner.
I love to make my own pizza sauce, since it
gives the actually feeling of making a pizza not just assembling one, by using a
store bought sauce. But I had to use a store bought pizza base, as I did not have enough time to make dough. Fresh pizza base dough needs to sit for a while and
rise to double of its size; so let’s keep this topic for later.
Difficulty level: Average
Quantity: 1 pizza per person
Prep time: 30-45 mins
Can be served as: Generally an evening snack, but you can add a salad & a dessert
to fill as dinner. You can opt for small bite sized pizza base as well,
available at most super markets.
Ingredients:
Store bought 6-inch pizza base
For Sauce: Makes enough sauce
for 3, 6-inch pizza base
Tomato puree – 200 gms (tetra packed store bought or if fresh ground
use 3 big tomatoes)
Garlic –5 pods; finely chopped
Dried herb mix – ¼ tsp (oregano, thyme, rosemary)
Powdered black pepper – ¼ tsp
Tomato sauce – 1 tbsp
Salt as per required
Sweet Basil – 5 leafs; finely chopped
Olive oil – 2 tbsp
For topping: Actually you can
add anything here; I’m not mentioning any quantity as you can decide how much
you really want.
Red peppers – Finely sliced
Yellow peppers – Finely sliced
Green peppers – Finely sliced
Sliced pitted black olives
Sweet basil leaves
Mozzarella Cheese – 100 gms will be enough for 4 pizzas of 6-inch (Some
of the brands have a mix of cheddar and mozzarella, this will also taste very
good)
Cooking equipment:
OTG or a Electric tandoor grill
A sharp long knife or chef knife
Cheese grater
Preparation:
The Sauce:
Add all the ingredients into a pan with the oil in first and cook till
the tomato puree cooks well and the oil rises on to the surface. Check the salt
and pepper so that its according to your taste. Turn of the heat and leave it to cool.
The toppings:
Prepare the toppings as mentioned above and grate the cheese and keep
aside. Do not cut/chop the basil.
The assembly:
Take the pizza base and spread the sauce over it. For a 6-inch you will
need about 3 tbsp of sauce, too much of sauce will make the pizza taste
pungent. Lay the peppers, olives and any other toppings you are using and then
the basil leaves (I added the basil on top of the cheese because some of our kids don’t like it and had a choice to remove it). Then sprinkle on top the grated
cheese, as generously as you want.
The Baking:
Place the pizza in a pre-heated OTG/grill and cook till the cheese
melts and the base become crisp. In an electric tandoor it will generally take 8-10 mins.
Cut when hot, into wedges and serve immediately with tomato ketchup.
Reality check
- Cost effective and a healthy option for an evening snack.
- You can refrigerate the sauce for 2-3 days and also use for pasta or a open faced sandwich.
- You can assemble the pizza in advance and freeze it for use up to a week to 10 days.
- Toppings can range from chicken, paneer, mushroom, broccoli, onions, sun-dried tomatoes, pepperoni, ham, bacon, mutton/beef Kheema, shredded meats, chopped fresh /tined pineapple, chopped pork sausages, chopped chicken frankfurters and many more. Or you can go for the classic Plain cheese margarita (just sauce and loads of cheese).
- If you like the pizza spicy, you can sprinkle some chilli flakes and mixed herbs for additional seasoning after baking it.
