Ingredients
- 1 quantity pizza dough
- 1 quantity pizza sauce
- 200 grams raw peeled prawns
- 100 grams cheese grated
- 75 grams bocconcini sliced finely
- ½ red capsicum cut into thin strips
- 40 grams basil pesto
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 220 °C.
- Divide the pizza dough into 2 balls and roll out each ball on a pizza tray. You can cover the tray with baking paper before rolling the dough out to help with clean up later.
- Use a pastry dock to dock each pizza.
- Spread a thin layer of pizza sauce over the top of each pizza.
- Sprinkle a thin layer of grated cheese across the pizza sauce.
- Scatter the prawns, sliced capsicum and bocconcini slices across the pizzas.
- Use a teaspoon to scatter dollops of pesto across the pizzas.
- Bake in the oven for 15 minutes.
- Cut into slices and serve while hot.
Over the years of making pizzas, I have tried many different combinations of pizza toppings, some with greater success than others. This prawn and pesto combination is one of the combinations that has proven to be quite popular/successful and in my household, it gets made on a regular basis.
The Choice of Ingredients
This pizza is all about the choice of ingredients that you use. The key starts with using fresh ingredients and keeping it simple to put it all together. Here are some tips for choosing good ingredients for constructing this pizza
- Pizza Sauce – While there is many pre-made sauces available at the store, you can’t go past a quick homemade tomato sauce mixture.
- Cheese – I go for a mozzarella and then grate it myself. Pre-grated cheeses tend to be covered in an anti-caking agent that often prevent them from melting properly.
- Capsicum – For the capsicum, look for a nice crisp red capsicum that has a sweet flavor.
- Prawns – Find fresh juicy prawns where possible. Try not to get imported that have been sitting in cold storage for several months. Some fish markets even sell them peeled and ready to cook as a bonus, go for the best that your budget will allow with the prawns. Supermarket frozen prawns will still work if that is all your budget will allow.
- Pesto – If you have the time, make your own homemade basil pesto. Otherwise, look for a nice fresh pesto at your local growers market. Supermarket pesto’s are alright, but they have no where near the same level of flavor as a freshly made pesto.
Constructing the Prawn and Pesto Pizza
Start with rolling the base, try get an even thickness and roundish in shape. How thick you roll it and to what size will come down to personal preferences here. Transfer the rolled base to a pizza tray or stone and then dock the top of the pizza using a pastry dock. Docking the pizza is important as it will help the pizza rise evenly.
Tip: Line your pizza tray with baking paper to reduce the cleanup at the end.
With your dough rolled out, the next step is to add your sauce. I start by pouring a quantity into the centre and then using the back of a spoon to spread it out. Keep the layer of sauce fairly thin or you will overpower the pizza with a tomato taste, and a soggy pizza too.
Some people like to leave a ring around for a crust, but my preference is to go to the edge. After all, who actually likes eating a dry pizza crust?
Many people will often from here add the toppings and then top with the cheese. However, the secret to good pizza is to go cheese first. With the cheese applied first it acts like a glue sticking the toppings to the base. Don’t go overboard with too much cheese, a thin layer should be sufficient, especially as we are also going to be adding bocconcini too.
Mozarella cheese tends to be what I top my pizzas with, I find it has greating melting properties and cheese stretch when cooked. Feel free to use a cheddar or something else instead if that is what you have or prefer.
To finish the pizza, the last step is to add all the toppings. Spread around slices of capsicum, whole raw prawns and some sliced bocconcini. Don’t overcrowd the toppings when doing this. We have chosen simple amazing ingredients, and adding too many won’t give the flavors of each ingredient a chance to shine.
With all the toppings spread over the pizza, finish by adding some dollops of pesto. I tend to use a teaspoon to splatter small amounts here and there.
Baking the Pizza
A pizza oven would be the best way to bake this pizza. However, not everyone has a pizza oven lying around available to use. My oven has a great setting for pizzas where it works as an oven but has an additional element for helping crisp the base.
To bake this pizza, I have found a temperature of 220 °C for 16 minutes gives great results.
Once cooked, give it a couple of minutes to rest and then cut up into slices. Top with fresh basil leaves and season with salt and pepper.
