My Pizza Nights

Mom’s simple recipe pulls me back into the kitchen year after year.
304

Illustration by Dola Sun

Of all the topics I might discuss in this column, I never thought baking—and providing an actual recipe—would be one of them, considering I don’t actually cook. I did cook, long ago, when I was single. I didn’t mind it, and I don’t think I was terrible at it. I schlepped through the Oakley Kroger with my list and made lots of stir fries, pastas, and soups.

When my husband and I married 18 years ago, we alternated cooking. We were on par with each other at first, and then he just became way better. I held on to making my favorite dishes, until they dwindled down to two or three things. And then just one. One dish remains my single culinary contribution to the household: pizza.

On pizza night, I root around in the cabinets grabbing ingredients and measuring spoons, knowing that flour will wind up everywhere. I no longer need to reference my written pizza dough recipe. I have it memorized. Sure enough, when my well-worn cookie sheets emerge from the hot oven, every unevenly cut slice tastes exactly the same as it did 40 years ago.

As any food writer will tell you, what makes a dish special is the story behind it. Not that I’m a food writer, mind you, unless a few stories for Cooking Light in the early 2000s count. But I love to eat, and I know how to spin a narrative. I may not be able to tell deglazing from a reduction, but I know about this pizza. There’s a reason it pulls me back into the kitchen year after year.


I inherited the kitchen table I grew up with. A vintage beauty, it has the look of a piece of furniture that will last forever. My family of four doesn’t need the extra leaf that our family of nine used back in the day.

The oval may be smaller, but the speckled white Formica is thick with memories. Sometimes I sit at the table and see it all in front of me: a random Saturday in the 1980s, the bustle of the house, the promise of a “Saturday night meal” served on this very surface.

Saturday night meals were the culinary highlight of any given week. They were special because they were different from the sensible weekday meals, with their meat heroes and well-paired starches, side dishes of vegetables, concoctions of fruit salads or Jell-O molds, and green salads featuring Hidden Valley Ranch dressing made from the packet. The Saturday night rotation was fun. It was kid food that adults could love, too—things like spaghetti, tacos, Frito pie, Cincinnati chili, hoagies, and pizza.

I loved all the meals, but pizza night was my favorite. I don’t know how many pizzas we would make to feed all of us. Four? Six? I can see the cookie sheets lined up on the stove. We’d be eating, grabbing slices, the cheese still gooey, and my mom would be hopping up, getting the next two out of the oven. In its heyday, pizza night was a family event, from my sisters grating the cheese to my dad slicing through the crunchy crust with the pizza cutter. My favorite part—other than shoving as many slices of pizza in my mouth as possible—was helping spread the dough.

Working with the pizza dough involved a very specific technique of flouring your hands (after a thorough washing and drying) and using the tips of your fingers to press the dough from the center of the cookie sheet to the edges. The goal was to get the thickness even and shape it into something resembling a rectangle. I usually gave up halfway through because I couldn’t get the dough to spread right. (From watching every season of The Great British Baking Show and listening to Paul Hollywood rhapsodize about gluten, I’ve come to realize that we were likely doing it all wrong.)

Someone would take over and fix my crust, and then it was on to the cheese. How much cheese must we have grated for all those pizzas? I just remember grabbing handfuls and dropping the pieces like rain, skitter-scattering over the sauce, sneaking some in my mouth when no one was looking. Sometimes, there were leftovers, which made for a Sunday lunch of cold pizza and joy.

Being the youngest of seven means you’re never alone, right up until the day you are. One by one, my siblings got married or moved out. I can’t remember when pizza night stopped being a thing, but I’m guessing mid-high school. I probably wasn’t even home on Saturday nights then, and if I was, I’m sure I had no interest in spreading pizza dough.


At graduate school at Miami University, I wasn’t homesick as much as newly appreciative of the traditions I’d grown up with. I called my mom one day and asked for the pizza recipe. That first time I made it in my tiny Oxford apartment, I forgot to add the extra two tablespoons of water to the dough. I was a floury mess, and I nearly gave up. I burned the crust and had to open the sliding doors onto my small deck, the icy air licking my arms as I tried to cut the too-brown thing before me.

But I had it down by summer. When my 8-year-old niece and 5-year-old nephew came to spend the night with me one Saturday, we made pizza. My niece, Rachel (who is 35 now, and my daughter babysits her kids; circle of life!), still remembers me showing her how to press on the dough with her fingers.

Making pizza has become linked to other memories, too. Like on 9/11, when I got sent home early from work and didn’t know what else to do. I ate my homemade pizza sitting on my couch, watching Congress members sing “God Bless America” on the Capitol steps. I made it one evening in 2008 in the weeks after I had my first child, when my postpartum world felt upside down and I wanted a piece of something normal. I’ve made it on more than one Election Day as a way of calming my nerves.

At one point, I had visions of recreating family pizza night. I tried to get my kids interested, but competing with Minecraft was too tall of an order. Now, more often than not, I just make it on a day when my husband isn’t able to cook because he has a meeting or errand around the dinner hour. Last time I made it, our kids—teenagers now—weren’t even home. My husband and I sat there, my childhood table holding my offering.

“The crust is perfect,” he said, holding up a piece and inspecting the bottom. “I’ve had practice,” I responded, taking a bite of my crusty, saucy, garlicy time machine.


Judi’s Pizza Recipe

Where did this pizza recipe come from? My theory is the back of a bag of flour or yeast packet circa 1975. You wind up with a thin crust that’s light in the middle and crunchy on the ends. I make it the way I learned, which likely follows no pizza-making best practices. To me, though, it’s perfect. Makes two pizzas.

Dough

  • 1 package of dry yeast
  • 1 cup warm water + 2 tablespoons warm water
  • 2.5 cups of flour
  • 2 tablespoons oil (I use olive oil)
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 1 teaspoon sugar

Sauce

  • 8 oz. can tomato sauce
  • Garlic (fresh or jarred; I use a heaping tablespoon of jarred)
  • Whatever spices you like (I eyeball healthy pinches of dried basil, oregano, thyme, and cayenne pepper)
  • Sugar, if you like sauce with hint of sweetness
  • Splash of balsamic vinegar (optional, but I like the little tang it brings)

Toppings

  • 8 oz. block of mozzarella cheese, grated
  • Half-block of cheddar cheese, grated (or other cheese you like)
  • Pepperoni and/or whatever toppings you like
  • Grated Parmesan, for after bake

Move oven racks to the lowest positions. Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Spray two cookie sheets with cooking spray.

Make the dough: In a mixing bowl, dissolve the yeast in the cup of warm water. Add the other ingredients, adding the extra 2 tablespoons of water at the end. Mix with a wooden spoon 25 times. The dough should only just come together. Cover (I cover with a dish towel) and let sit for 10 to 15 minutes. I don’t know why you cover it. It doesn’t really rise. But this is just what my mom always did.

Make the sauce while you wait.

Next, divide your dough ball evenly among the two cookie sheets. Sprinkle flour on top of the dough. I usually use a rolling pin to do the initial shaping (I flour the rolling pin). Then, I put flour on my hands and push the dough into the corners using the tips of my fingers.

Once your dough resembles a rectangle, divide up the sauce and spread. Sprinkle cheese and add your toppings.

Bake for 25 minutes. Sprinkle Parmesan as soon as it comes out (I like the stuff from the can versus fresh grated). Let cool for 5 minutes before cutting.

Facebook Comments