Ron’s Pizza Hack - My Italian answer to the Tortilla Hack.

In the past few weeks you could hardly avoid this «cooking trend» on social media. I must have watched about 100 different videos about this food hack and of course, i tried it myself. And yes, it definitely does taste good. But…

Have you tried the Italian version? If you are also a pizza lover like me, give this very simple recipe try. You can fill the «pizza» with your favourite pizza toppings or even just whatever is leftover in the fridge.

There is also a special secret to getting delicious tomato sauces that i’m going to let you in on as well…

Preparation time: about 20 minutes

Baking time: about 20 minutes - depending on the oven 

Difficulty: super easy

Ingredients:

1 rolled out pizza dough from the Coop/Migros/Lidl/Aldi/food store/grocery store of your choice Do you have an amazing recipe for the best homemade pizza dough?  - Let me know!

For the sauce:

1 can of plum tomatoes

1 clove of garlic - pressed

1 chili for those who like it hot

a few leaves of basil - plucked - about 1/2 - 1 tsp salt

For the pizza topping:

Everything your heart desires for the perfect pizza! For example:

mozarella

pesto from the day before from the fridge

a few pine nuts

a small handful of fresh spinach leaves

a few mushrooms, sliced

olives

vegan chicken strips - of if you like meat, chicken or salami.

A little tip for the perfect pizza sauce.

An Italian friend's mom let me in on this secret a few years ago.

For a typical, classic pizza sauce, Italians prefer to use whole canned tomatoes, mainly because they have already been cooked. The most aromatic and sweetest tomatoes are those harvested during the classic/natural harvest period - mid-July to early September - and processed into canned tomatoes immediately afterwards. The date of processing (and even the time) is printed on each can. Therefore, the next time you go shopping, make sure that the number - usually above the best-before date - is between 190 and 250! 

Preparation of the Pizza sauce.

Mix all the sauce ingredients carefully with a hand blender - it only needs a few and short pulses, otherwise the sauce will be too watery. Also, make sure it doesn't get frothy. Alternatively, you can just use a fork to mash the ingredients together in a bowl.

Preparation Pizza Hack.

Preheat the oven to 220 degrees. (mine is «vintage» so lacks convection,)
Roll out the dough and make a straight cut from the center of the dough to the outside with a kitchen knife.

Cover the first quarter of the pizza with the sauce and olives. Make sure that you always leave a little margin towards the outer part.

Spread the mozzarella on the second quarter...

Spread another quarter with the pesto, sprinkle the pine nuts…

...and spread the spinach on top and don't forget the mushrooms!

Last but not least, spread the fourth quarter again with the pizza sauce and top with the «meat» topping of your choice.

Now it gets a bit tricky, because the pizza dough is a bit softer than a dry tortilla, but don't worry, if i managed it, i’m sure you can do it too.

Now fold/fold the first quarter onto the second....

...then fold the second quarter onto the third...

...and so on, until all four layers lie nicely on top of each other.

Now carefully close the edges of your pizza so that none of the topping can run out, transfer your work to a baking tray covered with baking paper, put it into the oven and bake it for at least 20 minutes (depending on the oven).

After that, it should look something like this and, most importantly, smell fantastic

Quickly arrange on a plate, open a nice bottle of red and… buon appetito, è meraviglioso!