Italians use this traditional recipe to make straightforward but tasty pasta. On busy weeknights, when the fridge is empty, when you only need a light starter to your meal, or when you need fuel for late-night cramming sessions like “la note prima degli esami” (the night before final examinations), it is the first dish that comes to mind. Italian comfort cuisine doesn’t get much better than this.
| Prep Time: | 30 mins |
| Cook Time: | 50 mins |
| Additional Time: | 2 hrs 20 mins |
| Total Time: | 3 hrs 40 mins |
| Servings: | 12 |
| Yield: | 1 square pizza |
Ingredients
- 1 medium russet potato, peeled
- 3 cups bread flour
- 3 ½ teaspoons dark brown sugar
- 2 teaspoons kosher salt
- 1 (.25 ounce) package rapid-rise yeast
- ½ cup extra-virgin olive oil, divided
- 1 ⅓ cups water
- 1 serving olive oil cooking spray
- ¼ cup extra-virgin olive oil
- 6 medium garlic, crushed
- 1 (28 ounce) can whole peeled San Marzano tomatoes
- 2 tablespoons tomato paste
- 2 tablespoons onion powder
- 2 teaspoons dried oregano
- ½ teaspoon red pepper flakes
- 1 tablespoon white sugar
- 4 sprigs fresh basil
- 1 pinch kosher salt and cracked black pepper to taste
- 10 ounces grated Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese, divided
- 2 cups shredded mozzarella cheese
Instructions
- Place potato into a large pot and cover with cold water; bring to a boil. Reduce heat to medium-low and simmer until soft, about 20 minutes. Drain. Mash the potato and let cool to room temperature, 15 to 20 minutes.
- Combine flour, brown sugar, salt, yeast, and 2 tablespoons oil in the bowl of an electric stand mixer. Add water and mix on low speed until it comes together and no dry flour remains. Add the potato and increase speed to medium until dough is stretchy.
- Coat the bottom of a square, lipped baking sheet with the rest of the oil. Place the dough on the baking sheet and spread it out, edge to edge. Use cooking spray to coat plastic wrap. Cover the dough and let rest at room temperature for 2 hours.
- Preheat the oven to 450 degrees F (230 degrees C).
- Heat 1/4 cup olive oil in a cold, 8-inch skillet over medium heat. Add garlic and cook for 2 to 3 minutes. Reduce heat to low and flip the garlic until is lightly browned. Add tomatoes, tomato paste, onion powder, oregano, and red pepper flakes and combine for about 2 minutes; add sugar and cook for 2 minutes. Stir in basil. Season sauce with salt and pepper.
- Remove the plastic wrap and adjust the pizza dough if necessary, ensuring it fills the pan from corner to corner. Spread 1 cup of sauce over the crust using a spoon, leaving a 1-inch border. Coat the top with 1/2 of the Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese.
- Bake in the preheated oven for 5 minutes. Remove from the oven and add mozzarella cheese evenly over the entire pizza. Add more tomato sauce randomly over the pizza and add remaining Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese. Return to the oven and bake until crust is well browned and cheese is melted and lightly browned in spots, about 10 minutes. Cool at room temperature for 5 minutes before cutting.
- Fleischmann’s(R) makes a new pizza yeast… it works great.
- If you are using canned garlic, I would use the equivalent of 4 cloves.
Nutrition Facts
| Calories | 439 kcal |
| Carbohydrate | 34 g |
| Cholesterol | 32 mg |
| Dietary Fiber | 2 g |
| Protein | 19 g |
| Saturated Fat | 9 g |
| Sodium | 976 mg |
| Sugars | 5 g |
| Fat | 25 g |
| Unsaturated Fat | 0 g |
Reviews
The recipe for the tomato sauce is fantastic. We liked the amounts of cheese. However, the crust was doughy and much too soft. I thought the crust would crisp up. My potato wasn’t as mashed as it probably should have been and ended up in chucks in the dough, probably giving off too much moisture. I’ll try another crust next time.
I was really excited about this recipe, while the dough was proofing it looked so beautiful. After the pizza dough baked it was very soft and pillowy but was not crispy on the bottom. I was very disappointed as we could not pick it up with our hands, we had to eat with a fork and knife. No instructions on what size pan to use. I used an 18×13 and added the remaining oil that it called for. I think that is way too much, I should have used less, but wanted to follow the directions exactly as they called for. I will make again with less oil on the bottom of the pan and maybe my rating will be better. The dough 3 stars because we could not eat it by hand. The sauce 5 stars all the flavors were there.
Every now and again I make my own pizza dough, and I am usually disappointed. This one was really very good. I used bread flour, and instant mashed potatoes. The dough was easy to handle, it had a nice rise resulting in a fluffy on the inside and crisp on the bottom pie; similar to a sicilian pie. It would make a good foccacia too.
My four kids and husband are not always easy to please when it comes to food, especially all in one meal. I made this recipe today and everyone LOVED it! I made the dough in my bread maker and let it rise on a large cookie sheet covered in plastic wrap. It got pretty big so I flattened it out to form into the pan about 30 minutes before baking it. The sauce was awesome. The only thing I modified was I cut the garlic down to 4 cloves (that was plenty of garlic!) and I added a tablespoon of brown sugar along with the white sugar at the end. I also mashed the tomatoes with a potato masher once they were in the pan to smooth them out a bit. We topped with deli salami and pepperoni. My husband said it’s the best homemade pizza he’s ever had! I’ll definitely make it abd the sauce again!
I found this recipe very hard to follow. the directions are not clear and the size of the skillet told to use is way too small. That said, the pizza was delicious. The sauce was delectable, but who knows if I used the right sized baking sheet because it had a really thick crust