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This weekend I messed around with making pizza again. My last few pizzas have been Chicago Style deep dish, but Amy wanted some New York Style thin crust pizza. I decided to try my own sauce this time. I’ve tried to use spaghetti sauce in the past and had to spice it like crazy to get it close to a passable runny pizza sauce. It seemed like it would be easier to just start with tomatoes and go from there.

Make the dough first, because it will take an hour to rise outside the fridge. Or make it a day in advance and let it rise in the fridge for 24 hours.

Pizza Dough

• 3.5 cups (16 oz weight) flour
• 9 ounces (9.5 oz weight) warn water
• 1 tbsp olive oil (cheap stuff, not extra virgin)
• 1 tsp instant dry yeast
• 0.75 tsp salt

I use a KitchenAide mixer with a dough hook. Mix water, yeast, and salt at first until slightly combined. Slowly add flour. You need to use a spatula to kick the flour into the center. Once the dough is all mixed up, dribble in the olive oil. At first, this may just make the dough spin in the bowl. Help it a little with the spatula to get it all mixed in. Now mix the dough on medium for 15 minutes. When complete, put the dough into a very slightly oiled bowl and cover with plastic wrap. Let it proof somewhere slightly warm for an hour, or in the fridge for 24 hours.

Pizza Sauce

• 28 oz can crushed tomatoes
• 2 cloves garlic
• 1 tsp dried oregano flakes
• pepper
• salt
• red pepper
• other Italian spices

I used crushed tomatoes, because I keep those on hand for Chicago Style pizzas. Get good tomatoes. The best are supposedly Redpack, but I’ve been happy with the higher label tomatoes that I have found in the gourmet foods section of our stores. You can tell the differences between the store brand or common Hunts, etc. when making a pizza with tomato only which is typical for Chicago Style. Here you can cover up not great tomato with some spices.

You have a choice of either straining the tomatoes slightly or cooking out some of the water. I use a 9″ wire mesh strainer sitting in a Pyrex measuring cup. (Whatever fits.) Crushed tomatoes look like they will just pour through, but after the first but of tomato pulp going through it creates its own filter. For Chicago Style, I let it filter for 30 minutes. For this sauce, you only need to filter for a couple minutes. Save the juice in case you over filtered, as it has more flavor than water.  The goal in this case isn’t tomato paste.

Dump the tomato sauce in the blender and combine the oregano and garlic (pressed or minced slightly). Blend a little until smooth. Pour into sauce pan and heat on low. (This is a good time to prep your ingredients for the pizza.) Once the sauce is pretty warm, I finish spicing it. I add a decent amount of pepper, some salt, and some red pepper powder. I really like the sauce to have just a little zip to it. It shouldn’t hot like chili, but just a touch of tang.

If you want to cheat and start with spaghetti sauce, there are two problems. First, the sauce is too runny but hard to strain. You must cook it down. To fix it, try a little red pepper powder. This takes out the sweetness, the biggest issue. But it is almost as easy to do your own and it tastes much better.

My next pizza post will be about actually making them. Stay tuned.