Let’s be honest: without a specialist pizza oven, you’re never going to make an absolutely perfect pie at home. However, if you’re willing to compromise slightly, you can make a delicious homemade pizza with a frying pan (ideally cast iron) and a very hot conventional oven.
This frying pan pizza features homemade pizza dough that’s fried for a couple of minutes in a hot pan, then topped with a simple tomato sauce, mozzarella and any other toppings before being finished in the oven preheated to its highest setting. Ready in just 15 minutes, it’s a quick, delicious pizza that won’t necessarily rival Napoli’s finest, but doesn’t require any specialist equipment.
For this pizza, any dough recipe will work, but you can also use pre-made shop-bought dough if need be.
This recipe makes enough dough for four pizza bases. Unused dough can be frozen, otherwise reduce or increase the quantities to suit.
The tomato sauce is very simple to make at home, but shop-bought pizza sauce is also fine, at a push.
As for toppings, this pizza recipe is extremely versatile. Personally, I like to keep things traditional with just good tomato sauce, high quality mozzarella, fresh basil leaves, and just a scattering of thinly sliced salami, pepperoni or Italian sausage if the mood dictates. Absolutely any toppings can be added, however, from the more classic through to a selection of less typical, even controversial toppings. The pizza can also be made with a white base (sans tomato sauce) or with the tomato sauce and toppings on top of the cheese. As long as it’s cooked properly and the pizza dough recipe is followed, the whole dish is entirely open to interpretation and innovation.
Using a cast iron skillet isn’t absolutely necessary, although ideal considering they get extremely hot and are non-stick. Alternatively use an oven-safe frying pan that’s at least 10-inches in diameter and ideally non-stick.
When cooking, try to avoid constantly opening the oven door as the temperature will drop significantly.
Depending on the temperature of your oven, the pizza can take anywhere from 10-20 minutes to cook, but will likely take no longer than 15 minutes if sufficiently preheated. Check after 8-10 minutes and keep an eye to make sure the crust doesn’t burn.
Optionally brush the crust with a mixture of 1 tbsp honey, ½ tbsp water, ½ tsp chilli flakes and a generous pinch of salt once removed from the oven.
Related: London’s best pizzerias
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