Sunday, February 19, 2012

Fajita Pizza - My New Favorite

It's been a busy week of unpacking, cleaning, working, painting and cooking.  Tonight, we finally had a little break, so I made pizza.  A favorite of ours comes from one of the Pampered Chef Cookbooks, but we've adapted it just a bit for our liking.  It's called Fajita Pizza, and here's how you make it (Note the recipe below ends up making enough Fajita topping for 1 and 1/2, 12 inch pizzas.  My youngest son doesn't like anything except pepperoni pizza so I make one pizza half pepperoni/half fajita):

For the pizza dough, I like to use this recipe I found online.  It's pretty easy and doesn't have to sit all day.  It turns out to be thin and crispy, yet still chewy.  For one stop cooking, I'll duplicate:

Dough Recipe:
Ingredients:
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup warm water
1 package (3/4 ounce) active dry yeast
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon olive oil
Cornmeal for sprinkling
Sugar to activate yeast

Directions:
1 - Mix sugar with water.  Sprinkle yeast into water and let stand for 5 minutes (until foamy)
2 - Add flour, salt and olive oil to the water/yeast mixture.  Knead with a stand-mixer for 6 minutes.
3 - Let stand, covered, for 25 minutes
4 - Divide in half and roll out 2, 12 inch crusts (use flour to prevent sticking)
5 - Sprinkle pizza peel with cornmeal so that crust will slide off peel

While the dough is standing/rising, I make the Fajita topping;

Fajita Topping Recipe:
Ingredients:
1 chicken breast, diced (approximately 8 oz.)
1 red bell pepper, diced
1 green bell pepper, diced
1 medium yellow onion, diced
2-4 cloves minced garlic
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 teaspoon Southwest Seasoning (Emeril's is good)
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup salsa

Directions:
1 - Add olive oil and chicken to a pan and cook until chicken is no longer pink
2 - Add red and green bell peppers, onions and garlic to the pan and cook until tender
3 - Add Southwest Seasoning and Salt to the chicken/vegetable mix and cook for 2 minutes
4 - Add Salsa, stir and remove from heat

Making the Pizza:
Ingredients:
Pizza Dough (see above)
Fajita topping (see above)
8 oz. Shredded Colby Jack Cheese

Directions:
1 - Preheat oven to 425 degrees
2 - Place pizza stone in preheated oven for at least 20 minutes (I just put it in when I turn the oven on to preheat, which I do when I start making the dough)
3 - Roll out pizza crust (prepared above) on a pizza peel that has been sprinkled with cornmeal
4 - Put approximately half the cheese on the crust
5 - Add the Fajita mixture until the pizza is covered
6 - Top with remaining cheese
7 - Slide pizza onto stone and bake for 20-22 minutes

If you do this right, you should get a crisp crust that still has some chew to it, and a really good pizza with some good, bubbly cheese.  Making the crust from scratch is key...we used to use a store bough crust and it was ok, but the homemade crust is so much better.


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