We try to make Tuna Pizza with improvised ingredients. … You can however do a better job, than that in the picture of spreading the tomato sauce & other toppings over the pizza bottom. 😉
Ingredients
- 500 grams plain wheat flour
- 250 ml lukewarm water
- 1 teaspoon salt & vanilla respectively (slightly heaped)
- 2 tablespoons oil (preferably olive oil if available)
- 200 grams shredded/grated cheese (preferably mozarella or parmesan)
- 4 tomatoes (or a 425g can of pizza tomatoes))
- 300 grams canned tuna steak (preferably in oil)
- 50 grams margarine or other solid fat
- 2 red onions
- 1 paprika
- 300 grams white button mushrooms
- 1 sachet yeast (sachet enough for 0.5kg white bread loaf)
Instructions
- To make a very basic pizza we are going to improvise some things and it requires being quite flexible. What will come out should be seen as something that can later be improved on, for example if you get more or better toppings. This makes 3 large pizzas or about 11/2 large pizzas fitting on a large oven baking tray for at least 3 servings. A pizza is made of 2 main parts, the bottom & the toppings.
- To make the bottom, I quite often use the mixture for white bread, either self-made or ready-made. If you have a recipe for white bread, use it for this step. Otherwise add the oil and salt to the flour and ensure it is evenly mixed
- Prepare the yeast as stated in the instructions on the sachet and add to the flour in a large enough bowel.
- Cover the dough with a piece of cloth OR in a slightly greased clean polythene bag and place it in a WARM place for about 30 – 60 minutes or until it doubles in size. Covering is important and helps prevent the dough from drying up and forming a "skin". ... we shall move to other stuff ...
- ... peel the skin off the tomatoes after immersing them in hot water for a short while. Cut them into small cubes and then crush/mash them into some form of pulp. If you have Basil (chopped) add some, as well as the garlic and some salt to taste and mix.
- Cut the button mushrooms into thin slices and paprika and onions into rings.
- Turn the oven on so that it heats up to 200°C [about 390° F] as you do the next step. Grease the baking tray with the margarine or other similar fat.
- Get the dough and if it has risen considerably, knead it again briefly, so it deflates.
Roll it on a clean powdered table or other surface and spread it on the baking tray. Stretch and squeeze it to fit on the tray. This forms the bottom.
If you do not have 2 baking trays, you will have to do half of it and the rest of the dough should stay covered until it is ready to be processed.
- Spread the tomato pulp onto the bottom up to about a centimetre from the edge.
Drain the tuna, so it is free of the oil or whatever liquid it is in and distribute chunks of it evenly on the pizza surface.
Add the mushrooms and paprika, onions, etc … in such a way it looks attractive and more towards the edge! You can do a better job, than I did.
If you have grated or shredded cheese, sprinkle it generously and evenly over the pizza. If you have no access to any, it is not tragic.
- Place the pizza in the oven (middle) and bake for 10 - 15 minutes … or until it turns golden brown or bottom turns crispy, depending on your preference. (If cheese was added, it should have melted and started turning golden brown.) I prefer a soft bottom. Depending on the type of oven, it may be helpful to take a look now and then to ensure the pizza toppings and bottom do not burn.
Notes
Instead of tinned tuna, which I think is more easily available in Uganda, one can of course use cooked ham or bacon sliced into thin squares, which would give you another type of pizza with another taste.
There is no limit to the toppings – which can always be varied or combined.
Other possibilities for this or another round could be sliced tomatoes, sliced boiled egg, olives and so on.
Some people use tomato sauce in place of the crushed tomatoes. If you have the possibility of used canned pizza tomatoes, it may save you some time and work, but it comes to almost the same thing.
Although, pizza normally has cheese, it is no big deal if one cannot get some. There are indeed some types, such as a type of Turkish pizza which have none. Depending on the toppings, it can be tasty and remember it is only those who are flexible and ready to experiment who enjoy life most, at least as far as food is concerned.
I enjoy ALL my pizzas and almost everyone else who has eaten then. The one exception was a friend I was staying with one of the very first times I tried making pizza. Because I did not use bacon but some other type of meat, he thought it was not a pizza, but something he could not even try eating.
Another person just could not imagine eating spaghetti with any other sauce other than bolognese sauce!
If you are not distracted by such opinions, you will greatly expand the range of things you can eat through trying out or creating new dishes.
Do you have any other or better ideas? Please share them.