October 2009 Monthly Challenge: "Under the Sea"

[Bill/SFNM]

This month's challenge is about pizzas you create during October that feature seafood as a prominent ingredient. 

[Bill/SFNM]

Isn't anyone going to take on this challenge? I guess I was wrong about thinking this might be a popular theme. Anyway, I'm getting ready to make a pie based on the Goodfellas "award-winning" pie

The creation consists of a semolina crust with blackberry brandy champagne cream sauce, homemade fresh mozzarella, fresh lobster, shrimp, and lump crabmeat surrounded by a coconut cheese-infused crust.

Coconut cheese-infused crust? No way! That is way over the top for me. I'm just going to make a sherry cream sauce, spread it on a Neapolitan-style crust, and top with lump crabmeat and some amadeus or fontina cheese. If all goes well, I'll be baking it up tomorrow.

[Bill/SFNM]

The aforementioned crab pizza was a big disappointment. The crust was fine, the crab was delicious, the sauce was tasty as was the cheese. But the combination was pretty boring. I've got some other ideas for a seafood pizza that I'll try when I get back from a quick trip.

Anyone out there going to take up the challenge? Bueller? Bueller? Anyone? Anyone?

[shango]

I make a pizza with fresh sardine fillets, yellow tomato sauce, capers, hot pepper flakes, parsley and garlic. 

However, I won't be posting any pics of it.

[pizzaboyfan]

I do a shrimp,leeks,jalapeno, and pecorino
This one danced a little  close to the flame, but you can see how the high heat plumps up the split medium sized shrimp..

[Pete-zza]

I, for one, was pleased to see Bill/SFNM select seafood for this month’s challenge because I believe that seafood is an underrated topping for pizza. I personally have tried different forms of seafood on pizza, including the obligatory anchovy pizza, but I have also used oysters (http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,702.msg6358.html#msg6358), clams (Reply 78 at http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,7761.msg72399.html#msg72399) and crawfish (Reply 3 at http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,8476.msg73691/topicseen.html#msg73691).

For this month’s challenge, I decided to use smoked salmon as a pizza topping. Initially, my thought was to make some version of the deep-dish seafood pizza that member DeepDish 622 proposed at http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,9283.0.html. However, when DeepDish 622 failed to come back to the forum after posting at Reply 12 at http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,9283.msg81214.html#msg81214, I took that as a bad omen and decided to do something that was proven. In this case, I used Wolfgang Puck’s dough recipe and smoked salmon pizza recipe. Those recipes are given at http://www.marieclaire.com/celebrity-lifestyle/how-to/life-advice/wolfgang-puck-pizza-recipe.

For my purposes, I halved the Puck dough recipe to be able to make two 8” pizzas, and I modified the salmon pizza recipe to use a sour cream-based Greek tzatziki sauce in lieu of just plain sour cream or crème fraîche (which I didn’t have anyway). I also decided not to use caviar on the finished pizza. I saw it at the market but, at almost $10 for a small jar, and not knowing whether I would like the pizza, I decided to pass this time around.

The Greek tzatziki sauce was made from sour cream, fresh minced garlic, finely minced fresh dill, a little freshly squeezed lemon juice, deseeded and minced cucumber (dried on paper towels), extra virgin olive oil, and freshly ground pepper. I can post my exact tzatziki sauce for anyone who is interested.

For future reference in case I liked the Puck dough recipe--which is one of his basic dough recipes that can be used for just about any kind of pizza--I converted the recipe from volume measurements to a baker’s percent format. I also tweaked the amount of flour as I made the dough, in my case using my 14-cup Cuisinart food processor, to get a more accurate conversion. When I was done making the dough and divided the dough batch into two, I calculated a thickness factor of 0.11559 for the Puck dough. That represents a medium thickness crust. I’d also be happy to post my Puck dough formulation for those who are interested.

The instructions for the Puck dough recipe say that it is possible to hold the dough in the refrigerator for up to two days. That is what I did. When I removed the dough from the refrigerator to use it to make a pizza, I let the dough warm up at room temperature for about an hour or so. The dough at the time of its removal from the refrigerator had doubled in volume. I had no problems shaping and stretching the dough out to 8”. After doing that, I brushed the skin with some extra virgin olive oil and distributed julienned red onions over the skin, as called for by the instructions. The pizza was then par-baked on a pizza stone that I had place on the lowest oven rack position of my electric oven and preheated for about a half hour at 500 degrees F (as called for by the instructions). The instructions said to expect a bake time of 10-12 minutes in order to get a nicely browned crust. In my case, it took only 7 minutes. I finished dressing the par-baked pizza with the tzatziki sauce, smoked salmon, some capers, and a few sprigs of fresh dill as a garnish.

I thought the finished pizza was excellent. The crust was chewy and the bottom crust was crispy and I really liked the tzatziki sauce in combination with the smoked salmon. I even added more of the tzatziki sauce on top of the pizza, along with more freshly squeezed lemon juice.

The photos below show the finished smoked salmon pizza.

Peter

EDIT (1/16/17): For the Wayback Machine version of the above marieclaire link, see http://web.archive.org/web/20100818211926/http://www.marieclaire.com/celebrity-lifestyle/how-to/life-advice/wolfgang-puck-pizza-recipe.

[ERASMO]

Clam Pizza---My wifes favorite.

We make a New York Style pizza topped with provolone, and a little mozz. and sauted chopped clams.
We start out draining very well a small can of chopped clams.  Put them in a saute pan with a finely chopped clove of garlic, olive oil, salt, pepper.  Cook slowly for about ten minutes.  Let cool and set aside.  Stretch the dough, put sliced prov. on first, spread on the clams, sprinkle with a little italian seasonings and them a little mozz. 

Very Good.
We modeled this pizza after the white clam pizza served at the C-View Inn located in Cape May, NJ.

[Pete-zza]

As a second submission under the seafood challenge, I decided to use the second Wolfgang Puck dough ball to make a shrimp and sausage pizza with red onions.

One of the “big” Texas things this time of year is Texas Gulf shrimp. They have been running about 16 to a pound. I decided to use four of them for the latest seafood pizza. The shrimp were peeled, deveined, and cut into smaller pieces. They were then dredged in some Penzeys Chesapeake Bay seafood seasonings (http://www.penzeys.com/cgi-bin/penzeys/p-penzeyschesapeakebay.html). They were put onto the pizza raw, along with pieces of hot Italian sausage (about ¾ of a link, removed from the casing) that were also raw. For cheese, I used diced low-moisture, part-skim mozzarella cheese. I also distributed some diced red onion on top of the pizza. The sequence was some of the diced cheese, some of the diced red onion, the rest of the diced cheese, the shrimp pieces, the sausage pieces, and the rest of the diced red onion.

I thought this pizza was excellent also, but in a different way than the smoked salmon pizza. The smoked salmon pizza is an elegant pizza, one that might be served with a nice white wine in a refined setting. The shrimp and sausage pizza is more macho, and perhaps best served with a robust beer. I had a Shiner bock beer (a well-known Texas beer) with this pizza. This pizza and Sunday football are meant for each other.

The photo below shows the shrimp and sausage pizza.

Peter

[fazzari]

I continue to be fascinated with the flavor of the tiny anchovy.  One of the tastiest things I've ever had is a bechamel sauce seasoned with tiny bits of anchovy, and so this is the base of my pizza.  The following is a six layer laminated cracker crust topped with white sauce, a sprinkling of mozzarella and romano cheeses, chopped surf and cockle clams, shrimp and crab.

John

[Jack]

Damn.  I didn't see this until after we consumed the lobster calzones.  They were great, but they will not be repeated. 

Even though I dried the sliced pieces of lobster tail, they still put out way too much moisture, making the calzone soggy.  Garlic, onion, basil, mozz, parmesan made it a joy, albeit a tad sloppy, to eat.

A family favorite pizza is garlic shrimp.  I use 30/pound sized shirimp, butterflied them, putting them under the cheese and add sliced fresh garlic cloves on top.  I guess I need pics.  There are still two doughs in the fridge. . . . .

Jack