Gluten Free Pizza, As Promised

Well, I believe I've finally started to adjust to working full time and taking evening classes, and what better way to come back to blogging -- and the football season -- than a post about gluten free pizza? I've been owing my co-worker Joan this post for a while now -- I've got a recipe that my picky hubby loves and that I keep adjusting and playing with. Here's the latest incarnation:

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup + 4 tsp potato flour (or 1/3 and 1/4 cup)
  
• 1/2 cup potato starch
• 1/2 cup amaranth flour
• 2 tsp xanthan gum
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tsp dough enhancer
• 2 1/4 tsp yeast (1 packet)
• 2 Tbsp sugar
• 2 egg whites (or 1 egg)
• 2 Tbsp EVOO + liberal amounts of EVOO for rolling, brushing, etc.
• 1 cup lukewarm H2O
• Desired Toppings

Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
2. Mix sugar, dough enhancer and yeast in lukewarm H2O. Set aside to foam.
3. Mix potato flour, potato starch, amaranth flour, xanthan gum, salt. Add water/yeast combination, egg whites, and olive oil and mix until everything is well combined.
4. Coating hands and pan with olive oil, knead the dough for several minutes. I like to do this manually and keep pulling and shaping. Eventually when the dough feels stretchy, shape it and place it into a pizza dough pan that's been greased with EVOO.
5. If you want a thicker crust, cover and let the dough rise. I like thinner crust pizza though so I usually skip this step.
   
6. Bake in preheated oven 5-10 minutes, until done. My oven usually takes about 5 minutes. When it's done it will smell like potatoes and the bottom will just start to turn brown.
   
7. Take out the dough and let cool. This is usually when I start preheating my pizza stone.
   
8. When the dough has cooled off and the pizza stone has preheated, transfer the dough to the hot stone. Brush the dough with EVOO, add sauce (I usually doctor plain Ragu with oregano, marjoram, onion powder, crushed red pepper and a liberal amount of garlic), mozzarella cheese and any other desired toppings (Hormel pepperoni now says gluten free right on their label!). Preheat the oven to broil and place the pizza in the oven until the cheese is melted.
   

That's all there is to it -- it goes wonderfully with buffalo wings and Bard's Tale gluten free beer!

Pizza and Wings, Anyone?

Well, we finally took a break from wedding-related planning to sit back and watch a Yankees/Red Sox game. Itching to try out some of the cool new toys I received at my bridal shower last weekend like this awesome deep fryer, I decided to make cheese pizza and hot wings.

Now, I know there's a saying out there that there's no such thing as bad pizza or bad sex, but before going gluten free we had the advantage of living very close to an amazing pizza place that we took advantage of at least once per week. The first time I made gluten-free pizza at home, it was such a huge letdown. As a complete beginner, I tried Orgran's Pizza and Pastry Multimix with extremely disappointing results. To be fair, the second time I tried their mix I added yeast (an optional step) but it just wasn't like the pizzeria-style pizza that we've come to know and love. I'll be the first to admit slight perfectionistic tendencies, and I've been determined to make high-quality pizza.

After I got a little more comfortable in the kitchen (and amassed a larger stockpile of specialty flours) I grew bolder and started to experiment with dough recipes from scratch. The last recipe I had tried was featured on Epicurious.com, and while it was quite good... there was still something missing.

Well, this evening I found myself in a slightly less-than-fully-stocked kitchen, craving pizza and limited to a rather creative selection of flours. Running low on finely ground white rice flour and almost completely out of tapioca flour, I experimented with some of the more unusual flours populating my cupboard and refrigerator. I came up with a very interesting dough that included amaranth and potato flour, and while I have yet to perfect the perfectly round "pizza pie" shape when I make dough, the crust was thin with just the right amount of crispiness and cheese. It was amazing - this recipe is definitely a keeper!

While I was baking pizza crust, Vince was preparing chicken wings for the deep fryer. We made a hot sauce mostly based with Frank's Red Hot sauce, and since we (well, mostly I) like a little kick in our wings added freshly chopped jalapeño pepper. We fried the wings and tossed them in our sauce, and they came out looking and tasting exactly like you'd find in a restaurant! I think this recipe is definitely a keeper!

That said - this summer during track season, we're looking forward to checking out Nunzio's pizza in Saratoga. Because even though this pizza was unbelievably good there's still something nice about going to a restaurant and being served good pizza. :-)

By the way, a sweet end to the evening? The Yankees beat the Red Sox. Go Pinstripes!