Pizza Time!

I remember the first time I ever ate pizza. I was in high school, so the year was, oh, about 1960, I would guess. Beatrice Zeleznik, a girl a year or so ahead of me (in school!), had a cast party at her house--one of our school plays. Her mom had made pizza.

Oh, I knew what pizza was--but it just hadn't seemed all that appetizing to me. I'd never tasted it--at all. I'm not a big tomato fan (cannot--to this day--eat a fresh tomato), so I couldn't see how I could possibly like this food that had tomato sauce smeared all over it like blood at a crime scene.

But some friends convinced me. I tried it. Addict!

I cannot remember when I first made pizza, but it was probably not long after I started baking with sourdough (the summer of 1986, when I acquired my starter). I initially used pans and baked with them.

But then I discovered the pizza stone (one now lives in the bottom of our oven), and pretty soon I was baking them regularly--by "regularly" I mean, oh, every month or so--maybe ever couple of months?

It takes a bit of work. Mixing the dough. Letting it rise, etc. Shaping it. Then the toppings. Transferring the unbaked pizza from the "slip" (the big spatula, basically) to the stone.

The baking. Removal from the stone. Cooling and cutting. Consuming.

And, oh, the mess to clean up afterward.

When I was younger, I never thought two seconds about all the labor. I just did it. Loved it. When I was teaching, I sometimes had students over for homemade pizza.

I've also baked them for our son and his family--though not so much in recent years. My energy has declined dramatically (let's not get into the meds I'm on, the meds that have taught me some new rules about what I can and cannot do).

But this weekend ... I decided it was time to do it again. One reason for the decision? I didn't need to bake regular bread this week: The freezer is stuffed. So ... what to do with the starter? (I use it every week--it's like a pet (or a child!) that needs regular feeding--and attention.)

Joyce wondered why I didn't invite our son and family over. Here's why: I hadn't made pizza in so long that I was afraid I would mess it up, and I didn't want to do that in front of my family. Let me get the technique back, I thought. Then I'll try it in public again.

And so ... here's how it went.

• I fed the starter on Sunday night--let it bubble away all night.
• In the morning, about seven, I separated a couple of cups of starter to store in the fridge for next week, left the rest in the big mixing bowl, covered, in the fridge.
• About 11:30, I took the bowl out, allowing time for the dough to warm up a little.
• About 1:30, I prepared the pizza dough: sea salt, a bit of water, some olive oil, some local honey, some flour (oat, whole wheat, white).
• I let the dough rise for a couple of hours or so.
• The risen dough provides enough for four pizzas. Because Joyce prefers veggie pizzas, we had decided to make two veggie, two chicken-and-pineapple (which I love). We would bake the first two--one of hers, one of mine--then eat some of the second two.
• pizza sauce (I tried, for the first time, some made in Cleveland's Little Italy--good!)

It mostly went pretty well. I say "mostly" because I had a little trouble with my first one (Joyce's first had gone without incident). I use semolina flour on the slip so that the dough will not stick, so that the pie will slide easily onto the baking stone.* 

But after Joyce's something went wrong with my first one. It stuck a little, and it took some doing (and some other implements) to get it onto the stone. I nearly had a meltdown, by the way--another side effect of my meds: emotions lying very close to the surface.

From there on--no problems, really.

And, oh, did it taste fine. But let's not get into that: I'm veering too close to self-praise, something my parents taught me was a no-no. (And considering the near disaster with pizza #2, I have no cause to bray.) Pic below shows three of the four I baked.

All the classes from Hiram High School (which closed its doors forever at the end of the 1963-64 school year) meet each July for a reunion in Welshfield, Ohio (five miles north of Hiram). A couple of years ago I saw Beatrice Zeleznik at the reunion, and I told her that her mom had made the first pizza I'd ever eaten.

She told me her mom had loved to make pizza--had been so good at it. And I can most definitely confirm that. It changed my life--my waistline. And baking it myself has brought me tremendous joy over the years ... if it weren't for all that clean-up!

*I'm thinking of trying parchment paper next time; I've been using it the past few years with my regular bread--and it works spectacularly well.