Pizza Napoletana Recipe

How to Make Pizza Napoletana Recipe

Ingredients for Pizza Napoletana

4 round bread dough, about 20 cm (8 in) in diameter

¼ cup/ 50 ml/2 FL Oz olive oil

1 garlic clove, peeled

2 ×14 Oz /425 g/ 14 Oz cans tomatoes

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

2 tsp chopped basil

24 black olives

225 g/ 8 Oz Mozzarella cheese, sliced

How to prepare Pizza Napoletana

1. Preheat a conventional oven to 220 C/450 F/ gas Mark 8.

2. Oil 2 baking (cookie) sheet or 4 flan rings. If you use flan rings you will have a deep dish pizza. For a thin pizza, roll out the dough thinly and shape into round on the baking (cookie) sheets. Brush the dough with olive oil.

3. Rub the dough with a cut clove of garlic. If you like a stronger flavor, crush the remainder into the tomatoes.

4. Mash the tomatoes with a wooden spoon and season well with salt and pepper. Add the chopped basil. Cover the rounds of dough with the tomato mixture. Arrange the black olives and Mozzarella cheese over the top.

5. Brush the pizza with oil. Bake thin pizza for 12 minutes and for thicker pizzas reduce the oven temperature to 180 C/350 F/Gas Mark 4 and bake for a further 10 minutes.

Note: it is possible to cook a quick pizza in the microwave but it must be eaten quickly or the dough will become tough. Take a browning dish or pizza tray and heat for 4 – 5 minutes at full power. Brush with oil, lay the dough in the dish, cover it with the filling and cook on full for 5 minutes. Allow to stand for 3 minutes. The pizza is tasty but looks rather pale.