White pizza As inspired by Rachael Ray

submitted by cooking club

1 batch pizza dough (recipe follows)

1 TBSP olive oil

1 ½ cups ricotta cheese (whole milk preferably)

2 cloves garlic, minced

½ tsp dried parsley

Salt & pepper

8 oz. fresh mozzarella, thinly sliced

½ tsp dried basil or ¼ cup chopped fresh basil

Preheat oven to 475 degrees. Roll out pizza dough (following previous directions for pizza stone).

Drizzle olive oil over the surface of the dough, brushing up to the edge. Dot the surface of the pizza with ricotta cheese, going to ½ inch from the edge. Flick the garlic all over the ricotta. Sprinkle parsley and salt and pepper all over the ricotta and garlic. Place the mozzarella slices all over the pizza, leaving about 1 inch between slices.

Bake in preheated oven for 12-20 minutes. Remove when mozzarella is browning and the crust edge is golden brown. Sprinkle basil over the surface of the pizza before serving. Enjoy!

Pizza Dough

(Enough for one-16 inch pizza, though I double it every time I make it and freeze half the dough in a Ziploc bag)

*Note: I use half wheat or oat flour and half all-purpose flour and we love the whole grain flavor and texture. I’ve never made it using all WW flour so I can’t guarantee results going that way, but you’re welcome to try! I also typically end up using right around 2 ½ cups of flour but just keep an eye on it so you don’t over or under flour your dough.

1 cup warm water, about 100-110 degrees

1 tsp active dry yeast

1 tsp sugar

½ tsp salt

3 TBSP olive oil

2-3 cups flour*

Combine water, yeast, and sugar in the bowl of a stand mixer with dough hook attached. Let rest for 5-10 minutes.

To the bowl of your activated yeast, add the salt and oil. Mix to combine. Add your flour, 1 cup at a time initially, then adding in smaller increments as your dough starts to pull away from the sides of the bowl (see note). Once your dough pulls away from the sides of the bowl and is slightly sticky, knead for 5 minutes.

Place dough in a slightly greased bowl and cover with greased plastic wrap to let dough rise until doubled in size (you can also make your dough the night before or the morning you’re planning on making your pizza and just put this bowl in the fridge until you’re ready to roll out your pizza dough. The more time your dough sits, the better the flavor development of your crust).  If freezing your dough, place dough that has already risen in a gallon or quart sized Ziploc bag and place it in your freezer. When you want to make pizza, take your bag of frozen dough out of the freezer and put in the fridge to thaw in the morning. By evening the dough should be soft and pliable enough to roll into a pizza crust.

Use in pizza recipe as desired.