Homemade Pizza Dough

I did it!  I made pizza dough from scratch!  First time ever!!!  And I have to say, it tastes WAY better than the pre-made dough you can get in a can.  Are those called cans?  I keep going back and forth.  I know biscuits come in a “can”, but to me, it’s not a can unless you have to use a can opener.  Pressure sealed cardboard doesn’t really scream “can” to me.

I’ve started to ramble.

Anyway, I found this pizza dough recipe in the Pioneer Woman’s cookbook, and wanted to make it, but kept putting it off.  I mean, it involves yeast!  The only bread I’ve ever made is banana bread or dessert items.  Never have I made something that need to *gasp* rise!  But it actually wasn’t as scary as I thought!  Yes, I messed up a little when I didn’t mix it long enough to form a ball, but I remixed it after I noticed that it wasn’t rising after an hour of sitting, and it turned out just great.  Hey, you don’t learn if you don’t make a few mistakes along the way.

Here’s what you’ll need:

  • 1 scant tsp active dry or instant yeast
  • 3/4 cup warm water
  • 2 cups all-purpose flour
  • 1 tsp kosher salt
  • 3 tbsp extra virgin olive oil

Fill a measuring cup with 3/4 cup of warm (not lukewarm) water.  You’ll need it quite warm to activate the yeast.

They have these cute little packets of active dry yeast at the grocery store, but I think you can also get it in a jar.  Don’t mind my chipping nail polish.

The packet had more yeast than I needed, so I measured out a scant teaspoon (scant means not quite a full teaspoon).

Pour the yeast into the warm water.

Let the yeast and water sit for about 10 minutes.

Meanwhile, we can start making the dough.  Measure out your flour.

And dump into the bowl of your stand mixer.

Add salt.

And olive oil, and mix until combined.

While you wait for your yeast to finish “activating”, check on your son to make sure he isn’t putting anything weird into his mouth.  As you can see, he had some fun playing with the kitchen rug, as well as the cat’s food bowl while mommy was cooking.  Luckily, the only thing that went into his mouth were his fingers.

With your mixer on low, slowly add the water and yeast mixture.

Mix with the paddle attachment until the dough forms a ball.  You’ll know when this happens.  I didn’t mix it long enough when I took this picture, so don’t do what I did.  Make sure you mix it long enough or it won’t rise properly.

Again, this picture is a little misleading, so just imagine that it’s a nice little dough ball in there.  Coat the bottom and sides of a medium bowl with olive oil (or you could also use cooking spray), place the dough in the bowl, and cover with plastic wrap.  Let the dough rise for at least an hour, but overnight is best.  If you’re not going to use the dough within an hour or two, stick it in the fridge to continue rising.

Here’s my lovely risen dough the next day.  I was so happy when I saw that it was actually doing what it was supposed to do!

Spread some flour on your very clean counter.  You could also roll out your dough on a very large cutting board, but either way you’ll need to sprinkle some flour on the surface so your dough doesn’t stick.

Sprinkle some flour on your rolling pin and the dough and roll out until it’s about 3/4 inch thick.

To transfer your dough to the baking sheet, the easiest way is to roll it onto your rolling pin, and then unroll it onto the baking sheet.  This way you won’t tear it with your fingers while trying to lift it.

Clearly, I am not a pro at rolling dough into a perfect circle, but luckily this isn’t a pizza making contest, and I doubt the hubster will care what shape his pizza is.

Top dough with your favorite pizza toppings and bake at 500° for 10-12 minutes.  One thing I loved about this dough, as opposed to the canned dough, is that it cooks very evenly.  Pretty much every time I’ve made pizza with the canned dough, the crust is almost burnt by the time the middle is just barely done.  Not so with this homemade dough!  Perfectly cooked all the way through!

*Note: After making this recipe several times, I found that if I poke the rolled out dough with a fork a few times it will prevent air bubbles from forming during cooking.

Tada!!!  I went with the classic pepperoni pizza with homemade sauce.  Yum!

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The Pioneer Woman Book Signing

This weekend Steve and I drove 4.5 hours to Atlanta, GA for the Pioneer Woman book signing!  She was there promoting her book Black Heels to Tractor Wheels, which is the story of how she met, married, and started a life with her husband “Marlboro Man.”  It was a long drive, and I wanted to leave early enough so that we could get there in time to be towards the front of the line.  So I set my alarm for 9:00am.  Yes…what an early riser!!!  But that is early compared to our normal waking hour of 10:00 – 10:30am.  Now if you’re mouth is hanging open at this point thinking, “how can they possibly wake up that late every day?”, let me assure you that we make up for it by going to bed between 2:30-3:30am every night.

So anyway, I woke up at 9am, hoping to leave by 10am, but when I woke Steve up at 9:45 he gave his famous line of “give me a few more minutes.”  Ahhhhh!  Doesn’t he know that it’s THE PIONEER WOMAN we’re going to see!?  There are going to be hundreds of women there and we have 4.5 hours to drive….plus an hour time difference between Nashville and Atlanta.  WE NEED TO LEAVE NOW!!!

We finally ended up getting on the road around 10:45, and we had to stop by Barnes & Noble to pick up her cookbook because I didn’t want to get to the Borders in Atlanta and have them be sold out.  We also had to drop our house key off with Rustin, since he and Elizabeth would be taking care of the fur babies while we were gone.

For most of the drive to Atlanta we listened to Fox News on our Sirius XM Radio, listening to the news of the earthquake and tsunami in Japan.  After the president’s speech and Q&A it started getting pretty redundant so we switched to some tunes.

Then finally the country farms and pastures started diminishing and traffic and high rises started coming into view.  We were almost there!

Downtown Atlanta!  Woot woot!!!

When we exited the freeway, I noticed these beautiful blossoming trees and I just had to snap a picture!  Spring is finally here!  If only that horrible truck wasn’t there ruining a perfectly good picture.

I had always had these preconceived notions of Atlanta being super ghetto and dirty and unsafe.  But when we arrived, that was not the impression I got at all.  First of all, when we exited the freeway we had to drive through this multimillion dollar neighborhood with these gigantic stately homes.  Then, when we got to the main road the buildings were beautiful.  There were nice cars everywhere, and it wasn’t what I expected at all, which was a nice surprise.

Finally, we had made it!  And I wanted to be one of the first people to spot The Pioneer Woman, Ree Drummond!

Instead, I was the first to spot her husband, Marlboro Man, and her 2 sons, Bryce and Todd.  It was just about as exciting to see them as it was to see The Pioneer Woman herself!  They are in almost all of her pictures, so to meet them in person was really special.  I don’t know what I was thinking, but after Steve took this picture of us tons of women crowded in asking to take pictures and getting him to sign their books.  Why hadn’t I thought to ask him to sign my book?  He was, after all, one of the 2 main characters!

So I asked the boys to sign my book. 🙂

And then I waited…..

….and waited….

….and finally, it was my turn!   Again.

Yay!  Look at me!  My name is Joanna, and Marlboro Man is signing my book!

Thank you Romance Novel Cowboy!  It was so nice to meet you for the 2nd time in one day!

Here’s a close up of Bryce, Ree’s oldest son….but 3rd born child.  Look at his cute cowboy belt buckle!

Steve tried making friends with Todd, Ree’s youngest, but he was pretty shy.

Todd seemed like he was getting pretty bored.

So did Bryce.

How cute are these boots?  I had to take a picture of them!  And then I had to make everything else black and white so that they would stand out even more. 🙂  Boots are definitely a must for when I have kids.

This is Marlboro Man.  He is a REAL cowboy on a REAL ranch in the middle of nowhere in Oklahoma.

He is the cowboy that swept Los Angeles girl, Ree, off her feet so that she abandoned her plans to move to Chicago and settled down to be a country ranch wife instead.

These are their 2 beautiful boys (their 2 daughters were back home in Oklahoma).  Aren’t they cutie patooies!?

And look!  They’re holding hands!  So sweet!

Now back to business.  I was at the front of the line at this point, and had already been waiting for 4 hours.  There were still this many people behind me in line!  I can’t imagine what time they got out of there.

It’s almost my turn!  Only a few people in front of me at this point.  My back was really hurting by this time, but at least I had her book to read to pass the time.  Unfortunately when there was only one person in front of me, Ree decided she needed a potty break.  Sigh….why did it have to be right before my turn?  I know, I know, when you have to go, you have to go!

Oh my goodness!  I’m next!!!

Waiting patiently….or impatiently….I’ll never tell.

Then finally, it was my turn!  “Hi!  I’m Joanna and I’m your biggest fan!!!”  Just kidding, I didn’t say that.  But I was pretty nervous.

But she was SUPER nice, and gorgeous!

I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to think of anything to say, but she was very good at asking questions and keeping the conversation going….and actually seeming interested in what I had to say!  That had to be hard after meeting so many people in a row and still being able to make each person feel like they were the only one in the room.  Thank you for that, Ree.

Here I was telling her about our e-cigarette business and she said, “Are those those things they had on the Real Housewives of (insert city here)?”  And I was like, “Umm, I have no idea cuz I don’t watch that show, but I know you do!!!”  She mentions the Real Housewives show often in her blog.  We both had a good laugh about that. 😀

It was a great birthday weekend!  And I’m so glad we went!  Thank you, Steve, for making the 4.5 hour trek with me to Atlanta to see my favorite blogger, The Pioneer Woman!  You are amazing and I love you so much!

We couldn’t leave Atlanta without going to IKEA!!!!  We finally got a coffee table for the bonus room!  And several picture frames.  Oh how I love Ikea!  How do they offer all those items for such a good price!?

When I got home, these pretty buds were waiting to greet me.

Spring has officially come to Nashville!  Oh how I have waited for you!

Then I had to ruin the day by burning myself while making dinner that night.  I did this by lifting the lid off a boiling pot of water and allowing the hot steam to burn my wrist.  Sigh….

I Turned 25 Today

Today was my birthday!  I’m now a quarter of a century old.  Isn’t it amazing how fast the time goes by?  Sometimes I feel like I’m still in high school, although, there seems to be a lot less drama now.  Also, I have a lot more responsibilities now than I did then.  I’ve got a house to take care of, animals to feed and clean up after, and well….my honey falls into those categories as well, but now I have someone to love and who loves me back.  Someone I can share my hopes and dreams with, as well as my fears and annoyances.

Steve let me stay home from work today to work on my curtains, which was so nice of him.  We own our own electronic cigarette company for those of you who are wondering why Steve would be the one to decide if I could stay home or not.  It definitely is nice being your own boss!

I was able to fully complete 4 curtains, and now I only have 2 left!  Then all we’ll need to do is order the patio furniture from Home Depot and we’ll be all set!  I can’t wait to see what it looks like!  We’re trying to decide between these 2 furniture sets:

Tan Patio Furniture

Blue Patio Furniture

I like the blue, I just need to make sure my pillows will match it.  If not, I’m fine with the tan.  I couldn’t believe how cheap…..I mean inexpensive….they both were!  Almost all of the patio furniture we had seen before these were at least $999.  So $299 and $399 is quite a steal for a 4 piece furniture set!  And they offer free shipping!  Can’t beat it!

My love gave me these beautiful earrings for my birthday.  They’re aquamarine (my birthstone) and diamond.  And yes, “He went to Jared.”

We went out to dinner with our best friends Rustin and Elizabeth and Elizabeth gave me my veil as a birthday present!!!  This obviously isn’t a picture of it, but it’s the same style.  Cathedral.  LOVE IT!  I tried it on when I got home, and good news…..it fits!!!  🙂

In other news……I’M GOING TO MEET THE PIONEER WOMAN THIS WEEKEND!!!!!  If you’ve never heard of her you should check out her blog The Pioneer Woman.  She’s doing a book signing at Borders in Atlanta, and Steve and I are making the 4.5 hour trek out there.  Hey, this might be a once in a lifetime opportunity and I’m not going to miss it!  I’m literally on her website every day.  I can’t get enough!  She lives on a ranch with her husband “Marlboro Man” in the middle of nowhere in Oklahoma.  She’s written a cookbook, a romance novel telling the story of how she and her husband met and fell in love, and a children’s book about her lovable basset hound, Charlie.  She blogs about everything that goes on at her ranch, homeschooling her 4 children, photography, and hundreds of recipes.

Another highlight of our trip to Atlanta will be visiting the Ikea!  We don’t have one here in Nashville, and we haven’t been to one since we lived in California, so it’ll be fun to see what they have.

Well that is the summary of my birthday!  I’ll let you know how the trip to Atlanta goes when we get back on Saturday.  I can’t wait!  Thank you to everyone who wished me a happy birthday on facebook.  You all made me feel very special!