Japanese Style Pizza

Recipe by GodsMullet

Today we're going to make Japanese style pizza. While this may not be the most traditional recipe, I have a taste for it, and I don't want the ingredients to go to waste. If you've ever ordered a pizza in Japan, you may notice that several of their toppings are a bit different than what many of us are accustomed to - tuna, creamed corn, eggplant, bamboo shoots, nori, asparagus, potatoes, green onion, and various seafood are just a few. As far as sauces, there's the standard red sauce, white sauce, mayonaise, and squid ink.

I won't get too abstract today, just a mushroom seafood pizza with white sauce. I figure you can experiment on your own once you learn the basics.

Dough

• 2 cups of Flour
• salt to taste
• 1/4 ounce package of Yeast
• 3/4 cup of warm Water (100 F)

Mix the water and yeast together until yeast is dissolved. Mix the flour and salt together then add the water. Ball up and knead for about 12 minutes (for detailed instructions on kneading look at the dough part for the Gyoza). Once it's kneaded, ball it up and smooth it out; you don't want any major creases or cracks in it - all the gas from the yeast will escape and it won't rise properly.

Place the dough in a lightly-oiled bowl, and set on a preheated stove for about an hour and a half. It has risen when it doubles in size and you can poke your finger in it and the indentation stays.

Take the dough and lightly dust flour on it. Put it on a warm surface, place a bowl over the top of it, and let it finish rising (bout 30 - 45 minutes.

Sauce

• 2 Tbsp of Olive Oil
• 1/2 pint of Milk
• 1/2 pint of Heavy Cream
• chicken base to taste (about 1 1/2 Tbsp)
• 1 can of Minced Clams
• 3 - 5 cloves of Garlic
• 1/4 cup of Onion
• Parmeasean Cheese (1/2 cup to taste)
• flour (about 1/4 of a cup)
• water (about 1/2 a cup)

Saute the garlic and onion in the olive oil. Add the milk, cream, base, and clams. Heat until just about to boil, add the parmisean cheese and lower heat. Thicken it up by taking a little bit of flour and mixing with some water until its about the consistency of blood. -slowly add this to the sauce, stirring constantly until it gets to the desired thickness - about the thickness of watered down mashed potatoes.

Preparing the Toppings

Mushrooms: Season the Shitake mushrooms in simmering chicken stock for 30 minutes. Let cool and slice.

Shrimp: Place in boiling water for 3 to 5 minutes. Cool, and then peel the shell off. You can also butterfly them if you want.

Artificial Crabmeat: Break into bitesized pieces.

Avocado: Slice into segments.

Making the Pizza

Easiest way is to flatten the dough in the center of a lightly oiled pizza pan, and just keep working it until you get to the edge. Go over the edge a little bit and fold the dough back to create your crust.

Or you can choose to go the advanced way and hand-toss your dough. It's really up to you to devise a method that works for you. For myself I'll play with the dough a bit, slamming it into the counter and rounding it out into a disk. Once it's about 6 inches in diameter, I'll form my crust by taking the outer edges and pinching the crust onto it using a rope-pulling fashion. This also helps enlarge the disk as gravity pulls on the bottom of it. Once I'm satisfied with the crust, and before my dough turns into a donut, I'll flip it up into the air using my left hand sort of like a pivot, and my right to actually turn the dough. Once it is large enough, I'll place it on the pan, and rough out the edges. If your dough is made correctly (elastic and flexible), you should have no problem hand tossing your dough once you get a system down.

Lightly brush some olive oil on the dough, and sprinkle some oregano, basil, and parmeasean cheese on it.

Spoon a thin layer of sauce over that, and gently smooth it out - you want to spread the top layer of the sauce, not the bottom of it with the spices, otherwise they'll clump up.

Sprinkle your toppings over the sauce.

Add your cheese and top off with the avocado.

Bake in an oven set to 375 F for 25 to 30 mins (if you're like me and prefer a more doughier crust) or on 425 F for a crispier crust.

The fucking flash whited out my crust =(