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Someone asked me to post my pizza recipe. I am getting rusty, but I think this will work.

CRUST

1 cup flour
1 tablespoon dry yeast
4 oz. water
1/2 teaspoon pepper
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons olive oil

Warm the water to make the yeast happy. Dissolve the yeast in it. I usually dissolve half a teaspoon of sugar in it to give them something to feed on. When the yeast foams up, you’re ready to make dough.

Put everything except the water mixture in a Cuisinart with a regular blade. Turn the Cuisinart on. Dribble the water mixture in until the flour forms a single big glob. Continue to process for one minute. For bigger amounts (over two cups of flour), you may want to use the special dough blade.

At this point, you should have a dough that is squishy enough to work, but not sticky. If it’s too sticky to work, blend a little flour in. If it’s too dry, add water.

You can use ordinary all-purpose biscuit or bread flour. If you love gluten, you can use bread flour and add a spoonful of gluten flour. If you hate gluten, use biscuit flour.

You don’t need fancy 00 flour, but there is no reason you can’t use it if it makes you happy.

You don’t have to put oil in the dough. If you don’t, however, it may be impossible to toss, because the outside will dry and crack while you work it. This doesn’t matter if you roll it. A tossed crust will usually be a little better than a rolled crust, and it’s easier to get the flour off of it.

Form the dough into a disk. Coat the disk with a thin layer of olive oil. Put in a covered dish to rise. I oil the dish lightly. When the dough has at least doubled in size, it’s ready to form into a pizza. This amount of dough will make a thin 12″ pie with a half-inch lip. Toss it or roll it. Put it on a pizza screen.

If the dough holes while you’re working it, you can smoosh the edges of the holes back together and keep going.

SAUCE

4 oz. Stanislaus Super Dolce sauce
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
1/2-1 teaspoon sugar
1 tablespoon white vinegar
dry oregano to taste
1-2 tablespoons olive oil

Add enough water to the sauce to make it loose enough so it won’t form peaks. This is probably more sauce than you need for a 12″ pie, but you don’t want to err on the light side. Put enough sauce on the dough to make it red, but don’t bury it. The best tool for spreading sauce is your fingers. They are less likely to weld the dough to the screen.

Almost all supermarket tomato products are bad.

Use 6 ounces (weight) of Costco shredded mozzarella. You can also use sliced whole-milk mozzarella from the deli counter at a grocery. If you want to go all-out, find a place that sells Grande brand cheese. When the cheese is on the pie, sprinkle about half a teaspoon of oregano on it.

Scamorza cheese is also good, and you might enjoy a blend of mozzarella and provolone. Be careful about using part-skim cheese. It may burn too fast. If you end up with cheese that doesn’t have enough fat in it, you may be able to save it by tossing it in a tablespoon of melted butter before you put it on the pie. You can add flavor by adding grated cheese.

Almost all shredded supermarket cheese is bad.

Dump the pizza on a stone in a 550-degree oven. Cook for four minutes. Using an aluminum peel, remove the screen and leave the pizza on the stone. Bake for 2 1/2-3 minutes.

That’s it.

This may not be your favorite type of pizza, but it will give you a safe place to start. If you can stand to make dough a day in advance and refrigerate it, it will probably be better. You don’t have to use a screen, but it’s easier than using semolina and a peel.

Cheese pizza is the real test of a recipe. Any pizza tastes good when you cover it with crap. While you’re trying to get your recipe right, your best bet is to make cheese pizza over and over before you use toppings.

Enjoy.