Triple-Pepper Sicilian Pizza

I hadn't made a pizza in a long time and was hankering to bake a round. It was then that I espied Mark Bittman's recipe for a rustic Sicilian-style pie in the New York Times. The dough required 24 hours of refrigeration and multiple origami folds, all but ensuring failure in the hands of the clumsy Crumpet. A challenge! I accepted. The recipe, with some variations a la Crumpet, yielded a pie bursting with the colors of fall foliage and supported by a crisp yet billowy crust studded with air pockets. I don't know if I'll ever go back to rise-and-punch pizza dough.

yields a large rectangular pie cut into 12 slices

Dough

You will want to start the dough about 24 hours before baking time.

Ingredients

3/4 tsp, or 2 grams, yeast (less than half a packet)
1 7/8 cups water
2 1/2 cups bread flour
1 cup whole wheat flour
1 tsp salt
4 Tbsp olive oil

Process

Heat the water to wrist temperature.

Obtain a large, rectangular Tupperware container. In it, mix the yeast and 1 3/4 cups of the water (save the remaining 1/8). Mix in the flours with your hand. (I love to use my hands while cooking! If there isn't a little bit of hand in there, or, in one memorable case, part of a finger, it's not a Tipsy Crumpet production.) The flour will be rough, moist, and shaggy. Let it rest for 20 minutes, covered in plastic wrap.

Dissolve the salt in the remaining 1/8 cup of water. Mix the salt water into the dough. It's okay if it doesn't fully combine. Let the dough sit for another 20 minutes, covered in plastic wrap.

Moisten your hands, then spread 1 Tbsp olive oil on top of the dough. One-third of the way down the length of the dough, lift that end as best you can and fold it under so that the third of dough is underneath the rest of the dough. Do this on the other side. Basically, imagine folding a piece of paper one-third of the way down on both ends so that the ends meet and form a seam underneath the paper. Does this sound hopelessly confusing? I wish I could draw a diagram. It's not that complicated once you do it.

Put the lid on the Tupperware and slide the container into the refrigerator.

An hour later, repeat the process.

An hour later, repeat again. You have now folded over the ends of the dough three times.

Go and do something else for the rest of the day.

The next morning, perform your folds yet again with the remaining Tbsp of olive oil.

Three hours before baking, remove the dough from the refrigerator. Rick Easton, who helped develop the recipe, says that refrigerating the dough until baking is fine, but the Tipsy Crumpet took a more cowardly approach.

Now that the dough is relaxing at room temperature and forming bubbles, let's think about topping the pie.

Slice with sauce and toppings

Sauce

The original recipe called for no sauce, but I wanted a richer, more tomatoey pie and adapted a garlicky red pepper and sundried tomato spread I found on the One Perfect Bite blog. It should be thick but spreadable.

Ingredients

1 cup drained and coarsely chopped roasted red peppers from a jar
3 Tbsp water
1 large clove garlic, chopped
1/2 tsp dried basil
1/2 tsp red pepper flakes
1 cup sundried tomatoes packed in olive oil and herbs, mostly drained (a teaspoon or two of oil drippings is okay)

Process

Combine all ingredients in a food processor and blend until smooth. Add water as needed to thin the sauce for spreading.

Topping

Before beginning the topping, heat the oven to 450 degrees. Slide a heavy, nonstick jelly roll pan or cookie sheet (at least 13 by 18 inches) into the oven to preheat.

You can top with anything you like. Here's what I chose for a bright fall pizza.

Ingredients

1 small bag of mini multicolored bell peppers (contains about 10-12 little peppers)
1 Tbsp olive oil

8 oz fresh mozzarella
1 cup cherry tomatoes, halved (preferably the tiny, multicolored ones you can get at the farmers market)
1 Tbsp chopped rosemary
1 bunch fresh oregano leaves
salt and pepper to taste

Process

Remove the tops, seeds, and cores from the peppers (decapitate them and scoop out the innards as best you can). Slice them into thin rounds.

Heat the olive oil in a pan over medium heat and saute the peppers for 15 minutes.

Meanwhile, tear the mozzarella into small pieces.

Putting it All Together

When you have your peppers, tomatoes, cheese, and herbs assembled, return to your dough. Turn it onto a floured surface and gently prod until it's a rectangle roughly 1/2 inch thick.

Carefully take the pan out of the oven. Spread a tiny bit of olive oil on the bottom and sides of the pan and even more carefully daub the oil with a paper towel to blot.

Flip the dough onto your arm. Lift the other end with your hand so as to retain the shape of the rectangle as you carry it to the pan. Set it down flour side up.

Spread the sauce on the dough. Top with mozzarella, then peppers, then cherry tomato halves. Sprinkle the rosemary on top, with a little salt and pepper.

Retain the oregano: you'll add that once the pie has been baked.

With oven mitts, slide the pan onto the lowest rack of the oven. Bake for 5 minutes. Slide the pan to the middle rack and bake 15-20 minutes more.

When the pie is golden-brown and seems done, remove it from the oven.

Sprinkle on the fresh oregano leaves.

Slide the pie onto a cutting board and slice into 12 squares.

Mangia!

Look at those air pockets!

Notes

• Bittman's recipe calls for the oven to be preheated to 500. Most baking pans warn you against going above 450, so I turned down the heat and upped the baking time.
• You could possibly get away with 1 cup more whole wheat flour and 1 cup less white bread flour in the dough.
• I would love to try different topping combos including, but not limited to, sliced white mushrooms, red onions, kalamata olives, basil, tomato chunks, homemade tomato sauce, garlic, veggie sausage, whole sundried tomatoes, etc. The key thing is to not have a soggy, heavy topping: a thin layer of sauce or tomatoes, a reasonable amount of cheese, and a smattering of flavorful, well-chosen toppings is all you need.
• Bittman specifically calls for a metal baking pan rather than a pizza stone. After two hours of dithering at Le Creuset, Strosnider's, and Williams & Sonoma (I was in Bethesda), I bought the Williams & Sonoma Goldtouch 15 by 21-inch baking pan, which worked like a champ. It has little ridges all along the bottom that caused the pie to glide off the pan with no scraping at all (Bittman describes a mixture of blind faith and elbow grease to release the pie, which terrified me). I could hear a slight amount of metallic settling in the oven, but the pan worked wonderfully to produce a crispy, airy crust and is well worth the $40 you'll spend to be fancy.
• Bittman calls for putting the pan atop a baking stone that has been heating for at least half an hour. I would have done this, but my baking stone started releasing funny scents a few years ago and had to be put out of its misery. Hence, my decision to preheat the pan itself.
• It was easy to cut this pie, even straight out of the oven. It's all about the crust.

Verdict

5 stars: great leftovers; bliss on a cool autumn night

Curried Veggie Pie with Buttermilk Crust

Someone gave me a bag full of parsnips. "What will I make with these?" I asked myself. My love of all foods encased in dough caused me to Google "parsnip pie"; a recipe popped up that I tweaked to my liking. The result was a deep, creamy pie full of veggies, cashews, and raisins encased in a tender crust washed in egg and sprinkled with black sesame seeds. Perfect comfort food for a cold winter's night.

for a 9.5-inch pie dish

Ingredients

 

Crust

 

1 1/4 cup white flour
1 1/4 cup whole wheat flour
salt and pepper
2 tsp dried oregano
2 sticks cold butter, sliced
splash or two cold buttermilk
egg (for the wash)
black sesame seeds (for sprinkling on top; optional)

 

Filling

 

4 parsnips, sliced thinly
4 carrots, sliced thinly
8 shallots, chopped
1 cup frozen peas
4 small golden potatoes, diced
1/3 cup cashews
1/3 cup raisins
1/3 cup cilantro, chopped
2 Tbsp butter
2 Tbsp flour
1 Tbsp curry powder
1 1/4 cups whole milk
4 oz grated sharp cheddar
salt and pepper

Process

 

Crust

 

Sift flours and add salt, pepper, and oregano. Cut in the sliced butter (I usually crumble it in my hands until the flour is uniformly coarse, with some pieces as big as peas). Add the buttermilk a splash at a time, mixing with your hands until the dough comes together in a ball. Divide the ball into two, flatten into discs, and wrap each disc in plastic. Refrigerate for at least 30 minutes (or freeze for later use).

Filling

 

Place parsnips, carrots, potatoes, and shallots into a large pot or Dutch oven. Cover with water and heat until the water comes to a boil. Simmer for 5 minutes then drain the veggies, saving 1 1/4 cups of the stock.

While the veggies are simmering toast the nuts on a pan over high heat until they are golden-brown (a little burnt is okay).

In your pot, melt the butter. Add the flour and curry powder and stir for two minutes. Add the veggie stock and the milk. Simmer for two minutes, stirring until the roux becomes uniformly thick. Remove from heat and add the cheese (it's okay to keep the pan on the heat for a minute or so if the cheese doesn't melt; I use Grafton cheddar, which is particularly resistant to the charms of fire). Stir until the cheese dissolves to make a thick, creamy sauce. Add salt and pepper to taste. Stir in the veggies, peas, cashews, raisins, and cilantro. Mix well. Your kitchen will be the envy of all your neighbors as they inhale the warm Spice Islands aroma.

Let the mixture sit as you roll out the pie crust.

Preheat the oven to 400. 

Place one of your discs on a large piece of parchment paper. Place another large piece of parchment paper on top. Roll out the disc until it fits in your pie pan as the bottom crust. Poke a few holes in the crust with a fork, place some pie weights on top, and bake the crust for 10-15 minutes, until it begins to turn brown.

Meanwhile, roll out the remaining disc in the same way.

Allow the crust to cool (20 minutes is okay). Pour in the filling. Place the top crust on top and pinch along the edges. Hopefully, everything fits like a dream. Refrigerate for 30 minutes to firm up the top crust.

With a large knife, slice from the center of the top crust to the middle of the crust. Do this in a circle all around the crust. You'll have 6-8 slices radiating from the center of the crust to its middle. It will look fancy and delicious, like a pie in a stock photo. Beat the egg and brush it on top of the crust (I use my hands; the Tipsy Crumpet has no pastry brush). Sprinkle liberally with black sesame seeds. Your pie looks stunning!

Place the pie in the oven, but wait! Be sure there's a layer of aluminum foil on the bottom rack so that you don't have any burning pools of curry smoking up your kitchen as the pie begins to bubble. Bake for 25-30 minutes, until the crust is golden brown and the curry simmering beneath it. If you've refrigerated the pie longer than 30 minutes (you can leave it in the refrigerator overnight), bake for 40 minutes.

Remove and dig in!

Notes

• You can use any combination of veggies you like for this recipe. Next time, I'm going to sub 1 cup each of chopped cabbage, small broccoli florets, and small cauliflower florets for the parsnips. The parsnips tasted better to me over time (this pie ages well and will taste just as good, if not better, five days after baking), but at first, their sweetness seemed to clash with the savoriness of the other veggies. Green beans sliced into manageable pieces would also be killer in this pie.
• I used to enjoy a similar pie at Sally Lunn's, an English tea shop in Princeton, NJ that has since closed. I added the raisins in homage to Lunn's. 
• You could easily make this pie vegan by subbing coconut milk for the regular milk; in fact, this might work even better with the curry. I didn't taste the cheese at all after baking, so you could probably use another Tbsp of flour as a substitute. 

Verdict

5 stars. This is wholesome and winsome, with flavors to die for. The crust perfectly complements the spiced veggies in their curry cream, and a small slice goes a long way. This is a winter dinner to last all week.

Green Tomato Pie with Buttermilk-Cornmeal Crust

Inspired by Nothing in the House's green tomato pie, I decided to bake a pie featuring the unripe fruit, but savory instead of sweet. Being from the Bronx, I know next to nothing about green tomatoes and their properties, but I threw together a heap of my favorite ingredients, and the end result was smashing. A flaky, tender crust with a hint of grit gives way to a forkful of the season's bounty. I bought most of my ingredients at the Silver Spring farmer's market, and it was worth the airiness in my wallet to put this on the table.

Ingredients

 

Crust

2 1/2 cups flour
1/2 cup cornmeal
pinch salt
2 sticks butter
3/4-1 cup buttermilk

Filling

 

4-5 medium green tomatoes (the unripe kind, not the heirloom kind--they should be as hard and sour as a third-grade teacher coming back from vacation)
1 package veggie bacon
4 ears corn (or half a bag frozen, preferably Trader Joe's blackened kernels)
1/2 red pepper, diced
1/2 green pepper, diced
1/2 onion, diced
1 garlic clove
3 scallions, sliced
handful basil leaves, chopped fine
2 Tbsp cornstarch
pinch or two salt
generous amount ground pepper
1/2 tsp red pepper flakes
squeeze lemon
1/2 tsp honey
1 cup sharp cheddar, grated

Process

 

You'll probably want to alternate between the crust part of the instructions and the filling part. You can also make the dough ahead of time and freeze or refrigerate it. If you freeze, let it thaw for a few hours in the refrigerator before attempting to roll. You can also make the filling ahead of time and refrigerate.

Crust

Obtain a 10-inch pie pan. Set aside.

Cut the butter into cubes. Put in a bowl and place in the freezer until frozen--about 20 to 30 minutes.

Pour flour, cornmeal, and salt into a food processor. Pulse to aerate. (The lazy chef's way of sifting.)

When butter is frozen, pulse with the flours until the butter is in pea-sized chunks. It won't take a lot of pulsing. Even if you overdo it and the mixture turns into a sandy powder, let's face it, it will still be pie crust.

Pour everything into a bowl. Add buttermilk a little at a time and work it in with your hands until the dough just sticks together in a ragged clump. (I estimated the amount above, but use your best judgment.)

Form dough into two balls, wrap tightly in plastic, and place in the refrigerator for 30 minutes to an hour. Now you can start the filling!

Filling halfway there? It's time to roll the crust. Here is my no-fail, easy-if-you-have-all-the-components method.

Tear off two large sheets of parchment paper or wax paper.

Lay the first sheet on a silicon pie mat or your countertop.

Place one of the rounds of dough on the sheet. Place the other sheet on top.

Using a rolling pin (I prefer the French kind), roll out the dough, turning the mat or the sheet of paper as you go so that it flattens into an even circle (who are we kidding--a geometrically unclassifiable surface that looks vaguely round if you take off your glasses).

When the dough seems roughly the size and flatness needed to serve as a bottom crust, peel from the paper and place in the pie pan, trimming, adding, and crimping as needed. Prick some holes on the bottom and sides with a fork.

Place the pan in the freezer for 20-30 minutes. 

You have the filling all ready to go?

Don't reach for your iPhone just yet! You still have the other round of dough.

Repeat the steps above, chortling gleefully this time, as the dough won't have to labor like its more industrious twin to line a baking dish. It need only be dropped from above to form the perfect covering for your filling.

When the dough seems flat enough and the circumference long enough to form a top crust, take the bottom crust out of the freezer. Heap with filling, then top with top crust. Prick holes in the top crust with a fork.

Follow the instructions below for baking.

 

Filling

Preheat the oven to 425.

Put a little oil in a pan. Sear the veggie bacon. Remove from heat.

Thinly slice tomatoes and place in a large bowl. Add salt and toss.

Tear veggie bacon into pieces and toss with tomatoes.

Scrape the kernels off the ears of corn (or pour in frozen corn) and add to the tomato mixture.

Mix in red pepper, green pepper, and onions.

Crush in garlic.

Add scallions and basil.

Add cornstarch and toss until consistency is uniform.

Add ground pepper and red pepper flakes. Squeeze in lemon and massage in the bit of honey.

Grate in the cheese (I did this right into the bowl--the measurement above is an approximation).

Toss everything together with your hands. Add more of anything that seems underrepresented.

Once you've assembled your pie as described above, place it in the oven.

Bake at 425 for 10 minutes, then lower heat to 350 and bake another 40-50 minutes, until crust is golden-brown and edges are fizzing.

You may want to cover the crust with aluminum foil after the first 5 minutes, taking the foil off 10 minutes from the end.

Set pie on a rack to cool. Serve at room temperature or slightly warm.

I bet this pie tastes good cold.

Notes

 

• I completely winged this recipe, and suggest that you do the same. For the filling, use whatever you like, in whatever quantities. The green tomatoes provide a backdrop for anything pungent, spicy, savory, crunchy, or herbal.
• I actually used green olives instead of green pepper and onions, but tasting the pie a few times convinced me that green pepper and onions would have been the better call. This pie is so glorious, though, that olives won't exactly leave you crying in your beer.
• If you want, you can chop up some rosemary and add it to the pie dough. You can also use dried herbs.
• Gruyere would be good in lieu of cheddar.
• I used veggie bacon because I'm a vegetarian. Salty protein from a vegetable: modern life is delicious.
• I did not add a lot of basil for fear of overpowering the pie. You can experiment with more, or try other herbs such as marjoram or oregano.
• This recipe is for a 10-inch pie. For a 9-inch pie, your crust could have 2 heaping cups flour, 1/3 cup cornmeal, 15 Tbsp butter, and 1/2 cup buttermilk. Maybe subtract a tomato.

 

Verdict

5 stars. One of my favorite recipes yet and a summer keeper.