Sausage, Radicchio & Burrata Pizza
Posted: Mon Sep 08, 2008 2:23 am
Sausage, Radicchio & Burrata Pizza
The cast-iron pan cooks just as evenly as a pizza stone, and it beats the stone in speed. But the pan produces a crisper, darker crust than a stone, one that's slightly flatter than one made on a stone, with less lift at the edge of the crust. (Not surprisingly, while it makes fantastic pizza crusts, it doesn't work for baking bread because it cooks too quickly and burns.)
You can use your pizza pan to precook toppings. Toast the walnuts for arugula goat cheese pizza, or roast the radicchio for a sausage, radicchio and burrata pizza. Since the pan's already hot, it's simple and faster; you also don't have to use (or wash) any additional kitchen gear.
The instructions say you can bake pizza on the stove top, baking the crust on both sides first like a flat bread and then adding toppings - but pizzas baked in a hot oven (450 degrees works best) are far superior. On the stove, the crusts can deflate and even burn, and the toppings never seem to cook uniformly.
Pizza is not all the pan does. In the oven, it roasts vegetables in a flash; the preheated and pre-seasoned surface needs less oil than a baking sheet would. You can toast nuts and spices on it, roast root vegetables, fennel or tomatoes, or even use it to sear steaks or fish.
On the stove top, the pan makes flatbreads, pancakes and sandwiches. It makes crepes too, though my old crepe pan makes better ones on its shopworn metal surface. The Batali pan makes rougher, crisper crepes than I generally like. But what the crepes lack in texture, they make up for in sheer size: You can make giant ones, like those you get on the streets of Paris.
Mario Batali, Lodgepole and La Creuset all have versions of the cast iron pizza pan. Grab one and get to cooking.
Ingredients:
1/3 pound mild Italian sausage
3 tablespoons olive oil, divided
1 teaspoon fennel seeds
2 heads of Treviso radicchio
1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 recipe pizza dough
Freshly ground black pepper
4 ounces fresh burrata, sliced
Basic Cast Iron Pizza Dough (this section under Pizza Doughs)
Preparation:
Place a cast-iron pizza pan on the middle rack of the oven and heat to 350 degrees.
Remove the sausage from its casing and saute with 1 tablespoon of olive oil and the fennel seeds in a saute pan over medium heat, breaking apart the sausage as it cooks. Cook until browned, about 8 to 10 minutes. Set aside.
Trim the radicchio and cut it into three-fourths inch slices. Toss in a bowl with 1 tablespoon olive oil and one-fourth teaspoon kosher salt. Mound the radicchio on the pizza pan in the oven and roast, stirring and turning with a spatula, until it just begins to caramelize, about 10 minutes. Take the pan out, remove the radicchio and set it aside and return the pan to the oven. Turn the oven up to 450 degrees.
Brush the prepared pizza dough with the remaining olive oil. Spread the sausage then the radicchio evenly over the pizza. Grind a little black pepper over the top.
Slide the parchment paper with the pizza onto an inverted cookie sheet or peel, then transfer both parchment and pizza to the hot pizza pan. Cook until golden and crispy, about 12 to 16 minutes, rotating it once halfway through (use the parchment to do so). One minute before the pizza is done, add the burrata slices to the pizza in the oven, so that it gets just melted.
Remove the pizza from the oven either by pulling out the parchment paper and sliding the pizza back onto the cookie sheet or by taking out the hot pizza pan and placing it on a trivet. Slice and serve hot. Servings: 6
The cast-iron pan cooks just as evenly as a pizza stone, and it beats the stone in speed. But the pan produces a crisper, darker crust than a stone, one that's slightly flatter than one made on a stone, with less lift at the edge of the crust. (Not surprisingly, while it makes fantastic pizza crusts, it doesn't work for baking bread because it cooks too quickly and burns.)
You can use your pizza pan to precook toppings. Toast the walnuts for arugula goat cheese pizza, or roast the radicchio for a sausage, radicchio and burrata pizza. Since the pan's already hot, it's simple and faster; you also don't have to use (or wash) any additional kitchen gear.
The instructions say you can bake pizza on the stove top, baking the crust on both sides first like a flat bread and then adding toppings - but pizzas baked in a hot oven (450 degrees works best) are far superior. On the stove, the crusts can deflate and even burn, and the toppings never seem to cook uniformly.
Pizza is not all the pan does. In the oven, it roasts vegetables in a flash; the preheated and pre-seasoned surface needs less oil than a baking sheet would. You can toast nuts and spices on it, roast root vegetables, fennel or tomatoes, or even use it to sear steaks or fish.
On the stove top, the pan makes flatbreads, pancakes and sandwiches. It makes crepes too, though my old crepe pan makes better ones on its shopworn metal surface. The Batali pan makes rougher, crisper crepes than I generally like. But what the crepes lack in texture, they make up for in sheer size: You can make giant ones, like those you get on the streets of Paris.
Mario Batali, Lodgepole and La Creuset all have versions of the cast iron pizza pan. Grab one and get to cooking.
Ingredients:
1/3 pound mild Italian sausage
3 tablespoons olive oil, divided
1 teaspoon fennel seeds
2 heads of Treviso radicchio
1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 recipe pizza dough
Freshly ground black pepper
4 ounces fresh burrata, sliced
Basic Cast Iron Pizza Dough (this section under Pizza Doughs)
Preparation:
Place a cast-iron pizza pan on the middle rack of the oven and heat to 350 degrees.
Remove the sausage from its casing and saute with 1 tablespoon of olive oil and the fennel seeds in a saute pan over medium heat, breaking apart the sausage as it cooks. Cook until browned, about 8 to 10 minutes. Set aside.
Trim the radicchio and cut it into three-fourths inch slices. Toss in a bowl with 1 tablespoon olive oil and one-fourth teaspoon kosher salt. Mound the radicchio on the pizza pan in the oven and roast, stirring and turning with a spatula, until it just begins to caramelize, about 10 minutes. Take the pan out, remove the radicchio and set it aside and return the pan to the oven. Turn the oven up to 450 degrees.
Brush the prepared pizza dough with the remaining olive oil. Spread the sausage then the radicchio evenly over the pizza. Grind a little black pepper over the top.
Slide the parchment paper with the pizza onto an inverted cookie sheet or peel, then transfer both parchment and pizza to the hot pizza pan. Cook until golden and crispy, about 12 to 16 minutes, rotating it once halfway through (use the parchment to do so). One minute before the pizza is done, add the burrata slices to the pizza in the oven, so that it gets just melted.
Remove the pizza from the oven either by pulling out the parchment paper and sliding the pizza back onto the cookie sheet or by taking out the hot pizza pan and placing it on a trivet. Slice and serve hot. Servings: 6