Pizza alle Zucchine

Every time I would visit family in Italy, I would marvel at how delicious everything tasted.  Whether I was eating pasta alla chittara at Terrazzo Verde in Pescara or a panino at an Autostop on the autostrada, the flavors exploded in my mouth.  I wanted to eat this way at home...what was the secret to Italian cooking???  So 3 years ago, I purchased 3 cookbooks in Italy, hoping to come home and recreate those incredible meals.  Thus far, I have made 5 or 6 recipes.  Since my goal this year is to live bigger and better, I hope to cook 1 new recipe each week.

Appropriately, my first recipe is pizza.  Now, I have made pizza before but it is always the traditional pizza margherita - tomato sauce and mozzarella.  So today I made Pizza alle Zucchine ( Pizza with Zucchini ).
It was light and delicious!

Pizza alle Zucchine Recipe

Pizza Dough  (recipe below)
1 lb. zucchini, sliced thin
1 red onion, sliced thin
1 pint ricotta
6 anchovy filets
extra virgin olive oil
salt & pepper to taste

     1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees
     2. Saute sliced red onion in olive oil until carmelized
     3. Saute zucchini in olive oil til tender-crisp
     4. Roll out dough and place in pizza pan
     5. Cover dough with ricotta
     6. Then onions, zucchini & anchovies
     7. Drizzle with olive oil
     8. Cook at 425 degrees for 30 minutes or until dough is cooked and slightly crisp


Pizza Dough

3 cups flour
1 envelope yeast
1 tsp. salt
1 1/2 tbs. oil
1 cup water

     1. Heat water to 110 to 115 degrees - add yeast - until it foams
     2. Mix flour, salt, oil and water with yeast
     3. Knead
     4. Let rise in a bowl until double in size

You can cook the pizza in a pizza pan or on a pizza stone.  I have the Williams-Sonoma Pizza Stone and love it!  When I cook the pizza in a pan ( as I did today ) I coat the bottom of the pan with olive oil - it makes the pie crust crispier and gives it a little extra flavor.

I hope you enjoy it as much as I did!