Homemade Pizza

There are two parts to making your own pizza:
1) Making the dough
2) Adding toppings and cooking

I based my pizza dough recipe on Jamie Oliver's but halved the quantities and tweaked it a bit.

1) Dough

Ingredients:
7g sachet dried yeast
340ml warm water
1 dsp caster sugar
2 tbsp olive oil

500g strong white bread flour
Pinch salt

Makes 3 pizzas

Method:
1) Mix the yeast, water, sugar and oil together and leave for 5mins
2) Tip the flour and salt into a large bowl and make a well in the middle
3) Pour the liquid mixture into the middle and work the flour and liquid in together, starting with a wooden spoon
4) Then lightly flour a work surface and tip the dough onto it
5) Knead the dough for about 15 mins
6) Leave it to rise in a warm place for about 1h, until it doubles in size:

7) Poke all the air out of the dough, and divide it into 3 balls

At this point you can freeze the dough if you don't want to use it all at once

2) Pizza

Ingredients:
About 200ml passata
Vegetables (I used some sliced tomato and pepper)
Grated cheese (I used cheddar, but you can posh it up with mozzarella if you have it to hand)
Mixed herbs

Makes 1 pizza

Method:
1) Preheat the oven to 180 degC
2) Stretch out the dough into a circle or rectangle
3) Use a palette knife to spread the passata
4) Top with vegetables
5) Finish off with a sprinkle of cheese and mixed herbs

6) Cook in the oven for 15mins

Budget:

Yeast = 7p
Sugar = 5p
Oil = 5p
Flour = 25p
Salt = 2p
Passata = 20p
Cheese = 20p
Tomato = 10p
Pepper = 30p
Total = £1.24 (if you eat 2/3 now, and 1/3 later then about £1/ person)

Altered Lorraine Pascale's Cheese, Ham & Chive Bread

This is my absolute, all-time favourite bread recipe. There aren't many bread recipes out there that use self-raising flour and require no kneading or proving. Simply mix 'n' go...

This version is adapted from a recipe in Lorraine Pascale's excellent book Home Cooking Made Easy. Enjoy!

I've hidden it in the bread bin - I know that as soon as the rest of my family get home, it'll be gone in minutes!

Ingredients:
425g self-raising flour
2tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
150-200g grated cheese (mature Cheddar, double Gloucester etc all good)
Packet of ham (4 large/ 6 medium/ 10 small slices), chopped into squares
1/2 handful of chives, chopped with scissors
Mustard powder, paprika, salt, pepper
280-300ml water

Serves 4-6

Method:
1) Pre-heat the oven to 200 deg C
2) Mix all the ingredients in a large bowl except the water
3) Pour in the water, and mix to a sticky dough
4) Shape into a ball and place on a baking tray
5) Cook for 35 mins

Budget:
Flour = 30p
Baking powder = 3p
Cheese = 80p
Ham = £1
Chives = 10p (although I grow my own and just give it a haircut)
Spices = 7p
Total = £2.30, 46p/ person