the ultimate little miss blog

Perfecting Homemade Pizza

I want to start by apologizing for the delay in announcing the winner of our Blue Apron giveaway!!  Life has been CRAZY to say the least, and the day just got away from me yesterday.  I am happy to announce Danielle Lipke as our winner of the Blue Apron box, which contains everything you need to cook 3 gourmet meals!  Congratulations! I will be sending you an email with all of the details.
And for everyone who didn’t win, we encourage you to sign up for this amazing service…we promise you won’t be disappointed!

It’s no secret that pizza is one of my favorite foods.  And I am sure most of you can say the same.  Growing up in NJ, living in NYC for 10 years, trips to Italy and now living on Long Island, I have not had a shortage of good pizza.  Really good pizza.   Here are a few shots from our honeymoon on the Amalfi Coast, of some AMAZING pies.  I am drooling remembering how good they were.  Oh yea, in between taking pictures of my food I met my idol Barefoot Contessa, Ina Garten!! Love her!

My 32 year pizza journey has always led me to greatness. Although, there was a brief 4 year period during college at Virginia Tech that the decent pizza selections were slim.  I am actually not even sure any of it can actually be considered pizza.  I remember one of my first encounters with “Southern” pizza, we had ordered Papa John’s at the dorm, and when it arrived all of my friends immediately started opening these little containers filled with white dressing.  ”WHAT is that?” I asked, wondering why pizza came with dressing.  ”Ranch dressing!” they all exclaimed in unison.  You can imagine my reaction.  Yep — they dipped their pizza in ranch dressing.  I was horrified to say the least, but after a few months in, I too jumped on the bandwagon and dipped my pizza in ranch with the best of them.  I am not proud of it, but then again that pizza was nothing like what I was used to, so I figured my Italian family would forgive me this once.  Ha, and I wonder why I gained weight in college?!
Over the past year, Brian and I have been trying to perfect our own homemade pizza.  I am sure you guys remember the Pizza Throwdown we had about a year ago. Our friend Ryan has still not let me live that one down.  So I have been working hard to get myself to a place where I feel confident I can beat him, because I refuse to lose a 2nd time.  Especially to Duane Reade cheese.  That is just plain embarrassing   I might be getting close.  During the snowstorm a few weeks ago, we tried a few pies.  They came out OK.  The taste was there, but the dough was STILL undercooked!  I decided to ditch the pizza stone and try a pizza crisper.  I know pizza stones are supposed to be the best, but I just could not get my dough cooked well on it!  I did everything I read about online, including pre-heating the oven with the pizza stone in it before actually cooking the pizza on it.  Nothing worked.  Undercooked every time.  Well…I am happy to report the pizza crisper solved my dough problems!!!  I think the secret is the perforated bottom, which allows for direct heat and crispier pizza dough.  Check out our results !  I think it looks pretty close to those amazing pies we had in Italy!


The pizza crisper produced our best results yet.  We are having some friends over tonight, and I am going to be attempting homemade dough, something I have never tried before.  I need to have an advantage over Ryan, and I think this might be what puts me into the winner’s circle…finally.  Wish me luck, and stay tuned for the results…

We are always learning here at LMP and we would love to hear your comments, stories and tips on successful at-home pizza making…Happy Friday everyone!

xx, Michelle

categories: Baking, Little Miss Foodie, Pizza, Travel