Cheese Stuffed Pizza Crust

- December 27, 2012

Pizza....

Who doesn't love Pizzas... Ya, I do agree its a very healthy option. But its OK to indulge sometimes and enjoy the warm golden crusted freshly baked pizza with toppings of your choice... and to top it pizza crust is stuffed with cheese,,, more cheese...This unique thin crust pizza has a ring of cheese baked into the edge , so that you can enjoy cheese in every last bite of the slice.

Neil demanded me to make a Yummy Yummy Pizza for him.. Nowadays he has his own demands. He is growing independent and is in the phase of "The Terrible twos".. Sometimes he is very very understanding to an extent that even if I cough, he runs to kitchen and gives me a glass or water. he will wipe my tears with towel when I cut onions and will run to tell his dad that his mom is sad and is crying. And there are times when he wont agree to anything I say, he will be stubborn without any reason.. That's well , I guess, how the kids grow, passing through various stages in life. Now lets get back to the pizza Neil demanded. now Neil was an extremly good boy that day. So decided to make a special pizza with the extra Cheese,, Oh havent I told you before, he looooooooooooves Cheese.

For stuffed crust pizza, I have used a very very simple technique using cheese slices which are commonly available in India. I have used plain cheese slices, but you could used, cheddar cheese slices or red chilli cheese slices,, basically any kind of cheese slices that you love...

For all those of you who love non veg, try rolling up a ham slice or chicken ham slice along with the cheese slice for great twist to your regular pizza base.

Serves : 4 small stuffed crust pizzas

Ingredients:

For the stuffed crust pizza dough

3 cups all purpose flour
1 1/ tsp sugar
1 1/ tsp active instant yeast
1 tsp salt
pinch of baking powder
3 tsp olive oil
little more that 1 cup warm milk
12 cheese slices (3 for each pizza)

For the pizza sauce

tomato puree
chopped fresh basil
dried oregano
salt, sugar and black pepper to taste

Toppings

sliced mushrooms
sliced green olives
sweet corn
paneer cubes
red pepper cubes
yellow pepper cubes
sliced onions
sliced jalepenos
shredded mozzarella chesse

Method:

Mix flour, sugar, yeast, salt and baking powder in a large bowl. Add 2 tsp oil and rub the flour to incorporate all the oil.
Slowly add warm milk and knead to form a smooth soft dough for about 10 min. Now use the rest of oil to gently coat the dough. Cover the dough and let it rest in warm place till it double for about and hour.
After the dough has risen, punch the dough and knead once again to a smooth ball. Divide the dough into 4 balls.
Using a rolling pin roll a dough ball into a circle. Cut the cheese slice into two halves. Roll half cheese slice and place it around the edges of the flattened pizza dough. Similarly use rest of 5 half cheese slices to complete " The Circle of Cheese"

Now bring the ends of the dough over the cheese and press it down well until it encloses the cheese well. Make sure its a tight fit.

Pour some of the pizza sauce and spread it around till the edges. For the pizza sauce, I added tomato puree to the pan and added some chopped fresh basil, dried oregano. Sprinkle some salt, pepper and brown sugar and boiled it for some time.

Added lots of toppings. We like our pizza to be filled with toppings.

Grated some mozzarella cheese.

Baked in a preheated oven at 400F/ 200 C for 15 min on a wire mesh. The wiremesh made lot of difference to pizza. the pizza was cooked uniformly and had a golden brown crisp base. I used the Cookamesh.