If you are looking for some stellar summer pizza topping ideas, look no further than this Prosciutto Pizza with Strawberries and Arugula. With basil pesto as the base and lots of fresh mozzarella cheese, this addictive savory-sweet pizza is one you'll want to make again and again!
About the recipe
If you've been part of the Sweet Cayenne community for a while, you likely know that my favorite food is pizza.
We make homemade pizza pretty much every Friday night. When I travel to a new city, the first restaurants I search for are "best pizza restaurants." I've taken two pizza-making classes in Italy, and pretty much eat pizza every day whenever I travel there. Oh, and my lifelong dream? To eventually have a wood-burning pizza oven in my backyard #lifegoals.
What can I say? I LOVE PIZZA! And this love transcends into trying new topping combinations on the regular and testing new ways to make the best pizza you possibly can in the comforts of your own home kitchen.
If you've ever wondered "how can I make amazing pizza at home?" then follow the simple tips and guidelines shared in this post. Once I mastered these, homemade pizza became a Friday night tradition in our home!
Ingredients
- For the dough - all-purpose flour, yeast, salt, and water. The homemade pizza dough recipe I love most is and will not stray from is Jim Lahey's No-Knead Pizza Dough. When I'm in a hurry, I'll make the pizza on store-bought naan bread.
- For the sauce: in the summer when I have fresh basil, I make this pizza with my easy homemade Pesto. If I'm in a pinch or basil isn't in season, the basil pesto from Aldi is my favorite premade pesto.
- For the toppings - fresh strawberries, prosciutto di Parma, fresh mozzarella, fresh baby arugula and freshly-grated Parmesan cheese.
Instructions
Step 1: Make your dough the night before. This recipe requires an overnight fermentation, but it literally takes 3 minutes to stir the 4 ingredients together before you go to bed. A long fermentation will yield an incredible flavor and bubbly texture in your baked pizza dough.
Step 2: Practice stretching the pizza dough - this is a work of art, and good art takes practice! I'm still working on how to toss the dough in the air, and there are lots of amazing pizza stretching videos on YouTube that will help you practice.
If you need a little help from the rolling pin to even things out, that is ok. Be careful though, as the rolling pin can burst all of the little bubbles from the fermentation and lead to a flatter crust.
Step 3: Top your pizza lightly - in Italy, pizza toppings are minimal so that the crust doesn't tear or get soggy. This also ensures everything cooks evenly and makes for easier transfer to the pizza stone.
Step 4: Bake your pizza on the hot pizza stone to cook it from the bottom, and use the broiler to cook it from the top. Slice, serve, and enjoy!
Top tips
Shape your pizza dough on floured parchment paper - this will allow easy transfer from your counter to the hot pizza stone. You will bake the pizza on parchment, so plan to trim the parchment to the edges of the pizza before you bake it so that it does not burn in the oven.
Use a pizza baking stone - this is essential if you do not have a pizza oven. I use and adore this one from All-Clad, which I received as a generous wedding present from my brother/sister in law. There are a lot of good ones available though - this stone from Amazon is very affordable and has great reviews
Preheat the pizza stone in an oven set as high as it will safely go - I heat my pizza stone at 550°F. You will want to heat it for a good 30 minutes before baking the pizza. Place your stone on a rack in the upper third of your oven.
To make the best pizza in the oven, use the broiler on high when you are ready to bake the pizza. The broiler will cook the pizza from the top and the preheated stone will heat it from beneath, resulting in a perfectly cooked and bubbly crust that is crispy on the outside yet still tender on the inside. When cooked this way, your pizza should only take 4-6 minutes to bake.
Other pizza recipes
If you are looking for more homemade pizza ideas, I've got you covered! Pizza is my favorite food, so I'm always looking for creative combinations for homemade pizza toppings.
- Neapolitan-Style Meatball Pizza
- Peaches N' Cream Fruit Pizza
- Kale, Bacon and Butternut Pizza with Hot Honey Drizzle
- BLT Naan Pizza
- Rustic Roasted Grape and Chicken Sausage Pizza
- How to Host a Make Your Own Pizza Party
- Peach BBQ Chicken Pizza
Are you ready to make this Prosciutto Pizza with Strawberries and Arugula? Let me know how it turns out for you!
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Prosciutto Pizza with Strawberries and Arugula
Ingredients
For Jim Lahey’s no-knead pizza dough:
- 500 grams all purpose flour (about 3 ¾ cups)
- 1 gram active dry yeast (about ¼ teaspoon; not quick-rise yeast)
- 16 grams coarse Kosher salt (about 2 teaspoons)
- 350 grams water (about 1 ½ cups)
For the pizza:
- 8 ounces fresh mozzarella cheese
- ½ cup homemade basil pesto (or store bought)
- 4 ounces prosciutto di Parma
- 1 ¼ cup strawberries sliced into strips
- 2 cups baby arugula
- Freshly-grated Parmesan cheese
Instructions
The night before:
- In a medium bowl, stir together the flour, yeast, and salt. Add the water and stir with a wooden spoon until a sticky dough forms. Lift the dough with your hands and spray the bottom of the bowl with cooking spray. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap or a towel and let it sit at room temperature for 12-18 hours or until it has doubled in size.
The next day:
- Dust a work surface with flour. Punch the dough down and place it on the floured surface. Divide the dough into the number or pizzas you would like to make (two large, three medium, or four personal-size). Shape each portion of dough by pulling the right side towards the center of the mound, followed by the left side, then the top and bottom. Turn the dough over (seam side down) and shape it with your hands into a smooth circle. Dust the mounds with flour as needed during the shaping process. The dough should not be sticky.
- At this point, you can use the dough right away, or wrap the rounds individually in plastic wrap, refrigerate, and enjoy within 3 days. Place refrigerated rounds of dough on a floured work surface and cover with a towel to let them sit at room temperature for 30 minutes before using (which is a good amount of time to let your pizza stone heat up).
Making the pizza:
- Preheat a pizza stone in the upper third of your oven at 550°F.
- Carefully stretch the dough with your hands at a floured sheet of parchment paper to the desired size (depending on the size of your dough mound). See this video for reference on stretching. If your dough stretches out unevenly, you can use a floured rolling pin to even things out. Use a rolling pin gently and minimally though, as it presses out all the air bubbles that leaven your crust during baking.
- Top each pizza with a light layer of the pesto. Tear a ball of fresh mozzarella with your hands and place pieces of the cheese on the sauce. Follow with prosciutto, tearing it into pieces, then the sliced strawberries.
- Turn the preheated oven off and set the broiler on HIGH. Cut the parchment paper with scissors so that it just comes to the very edge of your crust (so that the edges of the paper don’t burn in the oven). Flip a baking sheet upside down and use tongs to carefully transfer the pizza to the flat side of the baking sheet. Slide the pizza from the baking sheet onto the pizza stone and cook the pizza for 3-6 minutes, watching carefully, until it is lightly browned and bubbly on top with black char spots. Divide the arugula on top and grate some Parmesan cheese over the entire pizza. Slice and enjoy while hot!
Notes
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