Friday Night - Homemade Veggie Pizza and Movie!

TGIF! I guess this is what everyone thinks by the time clock hits 3:00 in the afternoon and look forward to a fun friday night and a 2 day weekend ahead. We have been busy entertaining people for last few weekends and just wanted to take it easy this weekend. We usually eat out on a friday night and go for a late night movie show.But today, just didn't want to step out. But how could we let of our Friday night movie routine :).

I was thinking of making a pizza since last week and then I saw Mansi from Fun Food and Cafe   posting a Pizza Recipe. It looked absolutely great and made my urge to make a pizza stronger :) So today I made this Vegetarian Pizza and enjoyed our dinner with movie at home.

I almost followed her recipe. The only thing I changed is I didn't use any Whole Wheat as my husband wasn't really in a mood of a healthy pizza :). He wanted the taste of crust to be same as we get from restaurants. For the topping, I had put Green Pepper and tomatoes on the whole pizza, mushrooms on one half and Jalapeno Peppers on the other half ( I don't like mushrooms on pizza and my husband doesn't like Jalapenos)

So here is the recipe of delicious Vegetarian Pizza ( Veggies do make it healthy by the way :) )

Ingredients
Homemade Pizza Dough
1 (1/4 ounce) packet active yeast
1 tsp salt
1 tsp sugar
3/4 cup warm water
4 teaspoons olive oil
2 cups all-purpose flour

Pizza Toppings 
1 teaspoons olive oil
1/2 cup white mushrooms, thinly sliced
1 cup Green Bell pepper, thinly sliced
1 cup Tomatoes ( chopped, also remove the extra seeds from tomatoes)
1/2 Cup Jalapeno Peppers
1/4 cup tomato sauce ( I used Tomato and Basil)
1/2 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
1/2 cup shredded smoked mozzarella or Pepperjack cheese
3/4 cup shredded mozzarella cheese

** Feel free to add other toppings of your choice

Method
1. In a medium bowl, dissolve yeast, salt, and sugar in warm water and let rest for 5 minutes.
2. Using a spoon, gently stir in 2 teaspoonsolive oil . Add flour and blend with a spoon just until the dough starts to form; then using your hands, transfer dough to a lightly floured surface. Knead lightly for 5-7 minutes. The finished dough should be smooth yet heavy and dense. Also when you tap on the flour lightly with a finger, it should spring back.
3.Place the dough in a medium, clean bowl coated with olive oil and rub some olive oil on top of the dough.
4.Cover tightly with plastic wrap or a kitchen towel and and let rise in a warm, warm area until doubled in size; about 1- 1 1/2 hours. ( I just kept in in my oven)
5. Punch the dough down to deflate the excess air in the dough. Knead for a 1-2 minutes and keep it back covered for another 30 min. The dough will rise again and will give a puffer crust.
6.Transfer dough to a lightly floured surface and roll out into a 12-inch disc. Transfer to a lightly greased pizza baking sheet. Brush with remaining 1 teaspoon olive oil.

7. Spread the tomato sauce evenly over the crust. Top with the grated smoked cheese. Arrange the vegetables on top. Top with the mozzarella.

For a pizza stone, bake at 500 degree for about 10 minutes, or until both the top and bottom of the crust is brown and the cheese is melted. For a baking sheet, bake at 450 for about 20 minutes, or until both the top and bottom of the crust is brown and the cheese is melted. 

 Serve HOT!