October is national pizza month. I haven’t made a pizza for every day of the month so far, but I’m close. But a lot of them have been very similar, variations of pepperoni, olive and whatever peppers I have in the fridge.
This one happens to be the last ball of dough from Kenji Lopez-Alt’s New York style dough from Serious Eats — the last ball in a batch always seems to come out a little kooky, the dough has been in the fridge a little longer, it’s stretchier, but it still tastes great.
Lately, I’ve been using Lucini’s Spicy Tuscan tomato sauce from a jar. For a jarred sauce, it’s on the pricier side of the spectrum, unless you happen to find it at Grocery Outlet. The ingredient list is clean, no added sugar, and it has a good consistency for spreading on pizza, not too thick, not too watery. Despite the name, I don’t actually find it spicy.
As for the pizza itself, there’s no big secret with this one, other than layering the toppings on in order — sauce, cheese, pepperoni, criminis, olives and jalapeño. It might surprise you that a single pizza takes a whole container of mushrooms, but they shrink and I like a good layer of criminis.
So why is this called Ya Make Me Wanna Shoop? That’s the track you wanna be listening to making this on a Friday or Saturday night. “…You’re packed and you’re stacked, specially in the back/Brother wanna thank ya mother for a butt like that/Can I get some fries with that shake-shake-boobie?/If looks could kill, you would be an uzi..” You get the idea.
Take your dough out of the fridge and let it sit on the counter for at least 1 hour before baking. At the same time, preheat Baking Steel at 500F. When ready to bake, turn the heat up to broil.
Dust your pizza peel with cornmeal and flour. Stretch the dough into ~10-inch circle on the peel. Spread the sauce evenly on the dough, leaving a 1/4 to 1/2 inch border.
Cover the sauce with grated cheese and arrange the pepperoni, mushroom, olives and jalapeno on top - in that order.
Bake for ~5 minutes until the crust is well-browned and charred in spots, and cheese is starting to turn golden.
Topping amounts are approximate in this recipe. How much you use will depend on how the shape of your dough. I always err on the side of less toppings since they can weigh down the dough and in some cases give off too much water.