Today I tried yet again to make American Pizza. Last time I rolled the dough too thin and didn’t have enough toppings. This time, I used a whole batch of the pizza dough recipe. I also used the same pizza sauce recipe (1/2 cup of sauce for the pizza). For toppings, I included onions, olives, mushrooms (except on my side), red bell pepper, and of course cheese. Due to a cheese shortage I used “pizza cheese” from the supermarket instead of the mixture I’ve come to like (5 oz Mozzarella, 2 oz Swiss and 1 oz Parmesan).

Preparation: Like before, I preheated the oven to 500 degrees with a pizza stone. I rolled out the pizza dough and then transferred it to the back of a pizza pan covered with oiled aluminum foil. Next, I slathered on olive oil, stabbed it with a fork (to prevent bubbling), and then put the toppings on. I slid the pizza with the aluminum foil from the back of the pizza pan to on top of the pizza stone in the oven and baked it for 8 minutes.

Results: Well, it was edible but not all I was hoping for. At 8 minutes, the cheese looked broiled and the bottom of the crust looked done so I was afraid to keep it in longer. However, as I feared the crust wasn’t as crisp as I was hoping (and the cheese was definitely too done). Also, Jaeger felt that it could have used a little less oil and salt and needed a flavor boost somehow which I agree with.

Notes for next time: Try putting the crust (with a little less olive oil and fork marks) into the oven by itself for 5 minutes. Take the pizza out and lower the temp (maybe to 400?) put the toppings on, place on a pizza pan instead of straight on the pizza stone and place back into the oven until the toppings look done. Not sure exactly how to boost the flavor more.

I’m not sure if the new revisions will work or not. Part of the problem is that conventional home ovens weren’t designed to do pizza from scratch. However, I’m stubborn so I’m going to keep trying.