Quarantine Cooking: Pizza Night

One of my favorite pizzas from the take'n bake place that closed just before the pandemic is the chicken, artichoke, bacon with creamy garlic sauce on a thin crust. But first lunch. I was wanting to try the hubs' spicy pickles which made me decide on a cold lunch. I was out of pita and swapped it out for dolmas instead to go with the hummus, feta and olives.

And then pizza making. I chopped and fried bacon.

I chopped green onion.

I chopped garlic for the homemade Alfredo sauce.

I sauteed the garlic in butter and then added heavy cream and Parmesan cheese and continued to stir over low heat to thicken.

Finally the sauce was thickened enough to spread on my pizza dough.

I had parbaked the crust for 6 minutes before putting on the sauce which was perhaps a little too liquidy, but decided to go with it. Maybe I should have just used macerated garlic and olive oil.

And equally soft and liquidy burrata atop not creamy enough sauce.

Then the bacon and spinach leaves.

And then the pickled (because that's what I had) artichoke hearts.

And then I remembered that the pizza also calls for chicken. Doh.

I decided not to parbake the crust for the pepperoni pizza. Mistake.

And then decided to pop the chicken, artichoke, bacon pizza into the oven because it was almost dinner time. I set the timer for 6 minutes.

Back to making the pepperoni pizza. Mozzarella and provolone over the layer of grated Parmesan and pepperoni.

And the timer went off. Even after 6 minutes, the first pizza looked done. Or at least the top was done.

Parbaking was the right step because the crust looked crisp and done. Oh. And I had sprinkled polenta on the parchment paper before stretching the dough on it.

Too late to parbake the crust for the pepperoni pizza and went with it. Again it only took 6 minutes to brown the toppings to golden and bubbly.

Lesson learned. Parbake the crust before topping it. For now at least until I figure out a better method.