Farmer’s Market Pizza on Whole Wheat Dough

Ingredients

Dough:
1 ¾ cups whole wheat flour
2 Tbsp vital wheat gluten
1 Tbsp active dry yeast
½ tsp salt
1 Tbsp sugar
1 Tbsp olive oil
2/3 cup hot water

Pizza “sauce” base:
1 Tbsp olive oil
1-3 garlic cloves, pressed (to your taste)
1 tsp sesame seeds
1 tsp chia seeds
¼ cup fresh grated parmesan cheese
1 tsp dried oregano
1-2 Tbsp fresh minced basil (or substitute with 1 tsp dried)
2 plum tomatoes, sliced as thinly as you can

1 cup part skim milk mozzarella cheese, shredded

Various farmer’s market vegetables:
Broccoli florettes, diced
Red onion, diced
Red bell pepper, diced
Green bell pepper, diced
Yellow squash, thinly sliced and halved
Zucchini, shredded
Mushrooms, sliced

Directions:

Making the dough:
Mix dry ingredients in a large bowl. By thoroughly combining the flour, gluten, yeast, salt, and sugar before adding the liquids, you reduce the kneading time necessary to make sure the yeast is totally incorporated in the dough. Add olive oil and hot water. Turn dough onto lightly floured surface and knead for 5 minutes. Spray a medium to large sized bowl with cooking spray. Place dough in bowl, lightly spray top of dough and cover with plastic wrap. Place in the refrigerator and allow it to rise overnight 16-20 hours. (i.e. If I make my dough between 8-9pm, we can eat pizza the next day as early as lunch 12-1pm or for dinner between 5-6pm.) This may sound labor intensive, but it really only takes 15 minutes to mix and knead the dough.

Preparing the gourmet pizza:
Heat oven to 425. Place dough on a 12″-14” pizza pan sprayed with cooking spray (I use a 13” pizza baking stone) and roll out until the dough reaches the edge of the pan. The extra gluten helps the wheat dough rise higher and stretch without tearing better, but may make rolling the dough difficult. If so, simply pick up the dough, place the fist of one hand in the center of the dough and pull gently at the edges rotating the dough so it is stretched evenly. Return dough to the pan. Using a fork, prick the dough all over. This will help keep the pizza flat by preventing large bubbles forming in the dough during baking which may cause your toppings to slide around. Let the dough rest while you prepare the toppings.

Wash, slice, and dice vegetables. Brush dough with 1 Tbsp olive oil all the way to the edge of the crust. Press garlic over dough and spread evenly with a rubber spatula over the center of the dough, do not extend to the crust. Sprinkle the edge of the crust only with sesame and chia seeds. Sprinkle parmesan cheese over entire pizza dough, including to the edge of the crust. Your crust is now completely seasoned and you can begin to assemble the center portion of the pizza. Sprinkle the oregano and basil evenly over the center of the dough. In a thin layer, arrange the very thinly sliced tomatoes over the center of the dough. Sprinkle mozzarella over tomatoes, add remaining veggies.

Bake for 15 minutes. Let pizza rest for 3-5 minutes so cheese can settle. Cut into 8 slices and serve.