Pizza ...when the moon hits they sky like a big....

Pizza is one of my favourite things to make, packed full of flavour it's the perfect arena to experiment with different combos and on top of all that it's a huge crowd pleaser.

My tip for making pizza is a bread maker. Easy, quick and mess free (relatively speaking).
There's nothing wrong with store bought pizza bases, but for me I like to control the thickness of the dough (thin crust is my favourite).

For pizza sauce, I like to use 'five brothers' tomato and basil pasta sauce, it's neutral enough to not overwhelm the toppings but provides a good base.

I usually make enough dough for 4 pizzas. (I love leftovers, as much as I love cooking, I don't particularly want to do it every day). I roll out the dough rather thin and use some great pizza trays which are round and have holes, this allows the crust to cook from below and above making for a crisp, well cooked base.

Tip: once you've rolled out the bases, brush with a decent amount of olive oil, and leave to 'soak' in for at least 5 minutes before you put on the tomato sauce.

Now, toppings:
1: prosciutto and fresh rocket pizza
2: ham and egg
3: salami and fresh tomato
4: chicken and artichoke ( however, this time i was experimenting and just tossed some leftover Italian sausage and tonnes of garlic in the base for a cheesy garlic bread).

Here is how to make pizza:
1: prep each base with the tomato sauce, to 1 pizza add garlic.
2: slice up some mozzarella and fan equally over each base, next tear up some bocconcini and scatter over the pizzas minus the garlic pizza which is now ready to go in the oven.
3: layer one pizza with shredded ham, 1 with thinly sliced tomatoes and then salami and 1 with the prosciutto ( with the prosciutto pizza you can add the meat either before or after baking, i suggest after for a fresher taste, but it really depends on the quality of prosciutto you can get your hands on).
4: add quartered boiled eggs to the ham pizza ( about 4 eggs, hard boiled).
5: top each pizza with a scatter of grated mozzarella and tasty cheese and perhaps a little Parmesan or Pecorino, don't forget a sprinkle of seas salt and a twist of pepper. ( the only pizzas i would avoid the cheese treatment with is the garlic pizza and the prosciutto pizza with just need a little bit of freshly grater Pecorino after coming out of the oven).
6: you want to cook your pizzas in a hot oven (200 degrees Celsius, fan forced) for about 20 minutes. Turn down the oven if your pizzas are cooking too fast, if the topping cooks too fast you'll think they're ready but the base will be soggy.

Earlier I mentioned a chicken and artichoke pizza, to make this one you want to thinly slice some chicken thighs are cook off with some dried mixed herbs, salt and pepper.
slather some tomato sauce on the pizza base and sliced mozzarella and bocconcini. Spread the chicken across the base and you want an almost equal amount of artichokes in brine torn up. ( artichokes in brine, a huge jar, is really cost effective/ and soo tasty).
top with a little more cheese, salt and pepper. Toss in the oven, 20 minutes later, gorgeous, tasty pizza.

When you take the pizzas out of the oven you want to put some fresh rocket on the prosciutto pizza (if you opted not to cook the prosciutto, you'll obviously need to lay the meat over the cooked base before you add the rocket aka arugula).

Like I said, fast, tasty and great for feeding a crowd. Kat's pizzas.