Best pizza I've ever made? Possibly - Meatless Monday white pizza

 

During the last of too many trips to/from the auto shop today {After dropping off my car we got less than two blocks from home before I realized I had left my laptop in the back seat, so all the way back. Happy ending is that my car was repaired for free - I highly recommend Schaefer Auto Care for honesty and excellent work.} I thought it would be a good idea to make some lemon pepper pappardelle and a ricotta cheese sauce for Meatless Monday's dinner. By the time I got to the grocery store, a white pizza sounded even better.

I made my crust out of that pizza yeast, a little sugar, water, salt and some flour. I never measure a thing when I make crust, thus my crusts always turn out a little different with each pizza. I'm okay with that. Consistency isn't crucial, just good taste, as far as I'm concerned.

Once I got the crust all stretched out, I spread some extra virgin olive oil to the edges, then spooned out the ricotta, trying to get it evenly spread. The other day I slow roasted some roma tomato slices for some BLTs I took to a party. (And damn, even a lousy out of season tomato tastes amazing this way - preheat oven to 350F, slice tomatoes, lay slices on parchment paper on a cookie sheet, drizzle with olive oil and salt. After turning the temp down to 300F, roast the tomatoes for about an hour, until the edges begin browning.) Luckily I remembered I had some of those tomatoes leftover and added them on top of the ricotta. Then a layer of mozzarella and a grating of some fresh parmesan before baking in a 400F oven for about 25 minutes.

I had also bought a bunch of rocket/arugula for the BLTs and had a bunch leftover. Somewhere on the rocket container, it mentioned tossing the raw greens on top of a freshly baked pizza. Within just a minute, they had started wilting a bit and releasing their pungent aroma.

I've made a lot of pizzas and I've enjoyed most of them, but I think this was absolutely the best pizza I've ever made. It just all came together so nicely. And look how pretty it was!