To every Italians horror, here’s my twist on a Neapolitan style pizza, ‘Cockles, Laverbread, Ricotta, Mozzarella and Basil Pizza’. Using the frying pan technique, which mimics the conventional style pizza oven temperature. The grill and hob must be at the highest heat settings possible. Ensuring you save on electricity or gas, since it cooks under a minute, depending on how fast your cooker operates. The 65% hydration dough itself, can make it trickier and stickier to work with, but practice makes perfect. And you can always add more flour if you are finding it impossible to work with.

I fermented the dough for 14 hours, ”HUNGRY”, although 24 hours is substantially better for an enhanced flavour. Pairing the dough with a simple homemade tomato and basil sauce, for the base topping. Using fresh tomatoes and not tinned ones for a change, offering a much needed sweeter flavour.

Serves 2 Pizzas – 10 inch/ medium sized

Pizza Dough for 2:

  • 273g x Tipo 00 flour
  • 178ml x cold water
  • 0.25g x easy bake yeast (instant by Allinson’s)
  • 8.2g x table salt
  • Extra flour for dusting
  • Semolina flour optional

The ingredients are precise and require a smaller quantity scale to measure to a tenth of a gram, for those tiny amounts. Yes, I know…it’s slightly annoying. But, if your intentions are to make a great dough, it is best to weigh the exact amount. Although, relatively typing away, the yeast placed into the mix, is just a bit more than a pinch, if you are feeling dare-devilish.

(Note to self – you didn’t hear it here).

Dough Method:

” A uniform ball of joy”

  1. Mix the yeast with the water in a large mixing bowl until dissolved – if using dried active yeast (0.16g), it will require lukewarm water to activate it, fresh yeast (o.5g) can be mixed with cold water. But remember, the quantities will differ if you use a different type of yeast, since the ratio rate changes.
  2. Add the flour into the same bowl and salt.
  3. Combine the ingredients until a dough bowl forms. Then, place the dough onto the table top and knead for roughly 15 minutes until the dough begins to form a smooth outer layer.
  4. In a clean bowl, brush oil on the bottom of the bowl, place the dough inside and cover with a damp, wet towel for at least 1 hour to an hour an a half.
  5. Once the dough has doubled in size, remove from the bowl onto a lightly floured work surface. Slap and fold your dough, to form the somewhat sticky mess into a smooth, round, uniform ball of joy.

Don’t worry too much about this technique. Just take your time, imagining you suddenly dropped a pile of towels onto the floor and your instant reaction is to quickly fold them over. Repeating the cycle. Except, a dough needs to build up strength and elasticity to its advantage.

  1. Cut the dough in half and shape the balls nicely, using the palm of your hands.
  2. Once again, lightly brush the bottom of two airtight containers with olive oil and place the dough balls inside. Brush the top of the dough balls with olive oil, so they don’t dry out overnight and pop the lids back onto the containers.
  3. Place the dough containers into a refrigerator and leave fermenting overnight for at least 14hours – 24 hours max for best results.

For example, if you make it at 6pm the previous day, it will be ready for your evening meal at 6pm the following night. Just to put things in perspective.

Tomato and Basil Sauce Serving 6 Ladles:

“Sweet simplicity”
  • 10 x medium tomatoes
  • 1 x large onion
  • 2 x large garlic cloves
  • 1 x small handful of basil leaves
  • 1 x tbsp caster or granulated sugar
  • A ladle full of cold water
  • 2-3 x tbsp of tomato puree (to thicken)
  • Salt and pepper to season
  • Olive oil

The tomato and basil base sauce does serve 6 ladles but, you can use this sauce for your pasta or whatever concoction you desire to create. It will keep in the refrigerator for at least 5 days or you can just simply freeze it for another time. You can in fact, leave the sauce chunky instead of blending it into the silky smoothness, it requires within this recipe or as seen in the video link. Some people remove the seeds, but in my version I wanted to reduce the wastage amount and it really doesn’t do any harm whatsoever.

Method:

  1. Boil the kettle. Grab a large mixing bowl, place the tomatoes inside and pour over the hot water, enough to coat the tops of them. Blanch for roughly 5-8mins, once the tomato skins have loosened.
  2. Grab a strainer and place the tomatoes into a large bowl of cold water. Begin to peel the skins, using your fingers and remove the core with a small knife.
  3. Preheat the hob to a medium heat. Place a medium/large saucepan on top and drizzle olive oil into the pan.
  4. Peel and dice the onions and garlic cloves. Place into the heated pan, cooking and stirring until softened.
  5. Cut the tomatoes into quarters and add to the pan. And pour a ladle full of cold water inside too. Cook until softened.
  6. Blend the tomatoes into a puree using a hand blender or food processor/blender. Add in the tomato puree to thicken the sauce (you may need more), basil and sugar to reduce the acidity. Season with salt and pepper. And place into a container. Allow the sauce to cool before placing into the refrigerator.

Pizza Cooking:

  • 2 x tbsp cooked cockles
  • 1 & 1/2 x tbsp laverbread
  • Homemade tomato and basil sauce (1 ladle per pizza)
  • Basil leaves
  • Ricotta
  • Mozzarella
  • Black pepper and sea salt to season
  • 2 x overnight dough balls
  • Flour/semolina for dusting

“The day has arrived”

Ensure you have all of your ingredients at the ready, including any equipment, ladles, spoons etc. Since this type of cooking method, needs to be done quickly.

  1. Mix the cockles and laverbread together in a small cereal bowl.
  2. Preheat the hob and grill to the highest heat settings. Place a large frying pan onto the hob and allow to heat.
  3. Sprinkle flour and semolina onto a work surface. Place the dough ball on top of the floured work surface.
  4. Roughly, 1cm away from the outer rim/crust part of the dough, lightly press your fingertips into the dough, around in circular motion, using the outer rim part as a guideline. Working your way inwards into the centre part. Flip the dough over and do exactly the same thing.

  1. Next, keep the dough flat on the surface. And lightly use the back sides of your hands, to stretch the outer parts of the dough, rotating the dough in an anti-clockwise turn. Pushing and stretching with the back parts of your left and right hands. Just imagine how a record spins, except you are trying to stretch your dough at the same time as spinning it.
  1. Then, lay the dough on top of your knuckles, lightly stretching the dough in rotation.

  1. Place the dough into the screaming hot pan, drizzle olive oil on top and allow the dough to form bubbles.
  2. Ladle the tomato sauce on top, place on the basil leaves, scatter the ricotta, tear up pieces of mozzarella and spoon over the cockles and laverbread mixture.
  3. Season and drizzle with olive oil and place the frying pan pizza under the grill until it goes golden.

Remember to keep a towel or oven cloth by your side, in case you decide to touch the frying pan handle by accident. Keep the cloth wrapped around the handle once cooked.