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Sunday, March 18, 2012

Kids+Pizza=Fun!!

Enjoying the fruit of his labors!

When I found out we were going to have the joy of entertaining our good friends Jesse (age 5) and his sister, Jillian (age 2) we asked their dad what they would like to have for supper.  After mentioning filet mignon with cherry red wine and a cupcake (very funny, Dad!), he said that pizza was the children's favorite.  Actually, Jesse and Jillian are not alone.  Kids ages 3 to 11 prefer pizza over all other food groups for lunch and dinner.  My first thought was to arrange to have pizza delivered or pick up some frozen pizza at the grocery store, but then I thought it would be a "wild time" (as it was,confirmed later by Jesse when describing the evening to his father) if we made pizza together. 
We started by dumping all the ingredients for the dough into the breadmaker pan.  The flour proved to be especially fun!  I explained to Jesse as we added the yeast that the yeast would make the dough "puffy".  He didn't understand then, but he remembered it later when he punched down the dough and felt all the air escape.  Now it was time of unbearable waiting for the dough to be ready and we impatiently checked the breadmaker every few minutes to monitor its progress.  A few choruses of Hakuna Matata while viewing The Lion King seemed to help a tiny bit.  FINALLY the dough was ready!  We rolled it out, added a handprint, and put it in the oven to prebake.  After 8 minutes I pulled the crust out of the oven and let it cool for 5 minutes because I didn't want any burned fingers as we added the toppings.  We went simple with canned pizza sauce and pepperoni (Jesse's favorite, along with 36% of the folks who order pizza!). The cheese (Jillian's definite favorite!) was a bit difficult for a 5 year old to grate so I think I would buy a package of shredded mozzarella if I could do it over.   We put the pizza back in the oven to bake and worked together to make the table ready for our culinary masterpiece.  I must say it was a tasty treat heartily enjoyed by all!   

Say "Cheese"!
 
It's hard work to grate the cheese, especially when little sister is eating it as fast as you can grate it!


The Completed Masterpiece


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