Homemade Pizza & Other Strategies for Happy Living
It’s simultaneously a love letter to my Sicilian ancestors and my time in Chicago as an unemployed Architect.
It was summer 2009. We shared the cheapest one-bedroom apartment in the most run-down building in the most expensive neighborhood in the City of Chicago. The Great Recession was in full effect by the time my roommate and I were both unemployed and looking for ways to save money, have fun, and stay in the city. It never occurred to us that pizza might be one of them.
Homemade Neapolitan-Style Pizza
Pizza dough is inexpensive, very easy to make, and a great excuse to have a party. Fast-acting yeast makes it ready to bake in a little over an hour. [ more … ]
It was a fun and freeing and depressing time to live in any major city – but also an expensive one. Our five-story shipping-crate-of-a-building shared the block with a Bentley dealership and Mike’s bar. We had access to groceries, parks, the lake - everything except air-conditioning and a little self-respect. At least Mike gave good relationship advice.
Looking back now, it’s easy to see that unemployment (and single-life) in a recession is far less stressful than it is in a pandemic. Things were difficult, but they seem ignorantly blissful now. These are the kinds of life-experiences that make you simultaneously love life and loathe capitalism (and take the stairs because you have the time and need the exercise - and the elevator is kind of sketchy). Oftentimes, hard things are just the challenge our tired brains and bodies need to tip the scales a little closer to enjoying life. For us, it meant finding cheap ways to entertain ourselves and spend time eating and drinking with our employed friends - resulting in a handful of resourceful strategies for a happy, unemployed life in the Windy City.
5 (very food-centric) Strategies for Happy Living:
[ 1 ] Walk instead of taking public transportation.
The cost of two train rides ($4.50 at the time) is better spent on two bottles of two-buck-chuck (the bargain wine from Trader Joe’s) to make sangria.
[ 2 ] Invest in a good bottle of Brandy.
A batch of sangria doesn’t require much Brandy, but it isn’t worth making if it doesn’t actually taste good.
[ 3 ] Bargain for bulk fruit prices at the farmers’ market.
Cut them up and freeze them. Frozen fruit makes great ice, doesn’t water down your sangria, and keeps forever. Citrus rinds also make excellent projectiles for a casual game of “fruit on the bus.” When one lives in a corner apartment on several major bus routes, targeting bus-roofs with fruit scraps is just the challenge needed to pass a summer afternoon. (Throw early. Buses move faster than you think.)
[ 4 ] Host a pizza party and provide the dough.
Pizza dough is inexpensive and very easy to make when you have a lot of free time. Let your employed friends bring the sauce and the toppings, and eat like royalty on a pauper’s budget.
[ 5 ] Make the dough ahead, at home; but have your party at someone else’s house.
An un-air-conditioned apartment is an excellent place for dough to rise, but a terrible place to bake during the summer!
Our “porch” hosted lip-syncing performances, sangria consumption, and people-watching.
It was a beautiful Friday afternoon and the air was warm, but dry – perfect for proofing pizza dough. The apartment had a lot of windows and they generally stayed open around the clock. We were on the 5th floor and there wasn’t anything to steal anyway. The window was big enough to climb out onto the fire escape and use the sill as an uncomfortable seat – a blanket helped make it more bearable, as did sangria consumption. On occasion, we would opt to drink on the roof if we felt like using a combination of trash cans and a creaky ladder to push open the hatch and climb out. Monitoring sangria consumption was critical on these days or else you’d be stuck on the roof until you were coordinated enough to get back down the ladder.
Red Sangria with Frozen Fruit
Pizza dough waiting to rise. This will make enough for four (4) 10-inch pizzas.
While we waited for our rising dough, fruit-throwing contests usually ensued.
Brian was a casual-17-mile-runner and soccer-playing Landscape Architect – he won most things we played. We eventually considered the logistics of transporting over two pounds of pizza dough through the Loop, and about three miles South, to our friend Kate’s apartment for our pizza party (See Strategy #5). Holding covered bowls of dough on the train would probably qualify as suspicious activity – but then, there are much stranger things to see on trains. We, of course, followed our own advice and decided to walk. The fresh air would benefit the dough, right? Long walks had never stopped us before. We were known to have taken in a “free” concert or two from the bushes near the lakefront at Soldier Field – sangria in tow. This was our beat.
My Windy City partners-in-crime.
Kate and her Argentine boyfriend (Paco - now her husband – thirteen years later – I feel old) greeted us with open arms, more wine, and a lot of toppings. Kate and I studied Architecture together in Louisiana and ventured to the Windy City only a year prior - essentially meeting Brian and Paco with their entire group of friends on a blind date through other mutual friends at the Lion Head Pub. They welcomed two pie-eyed southerners to the big city with open arms and became our best friends. The pizza dough (and many group dinners, late nights, and other escapades around the city) held us together for a truly memorable time in life.
Materials & Methods
[ 1 ] Proofing the yeast
Proofing the yeast is important to make sure it is actually alive and will make the dough rise. The foam you see is the result of yeast metabolizing (eating) the sugar in the proofing mixture. If it doesn’t foam, it won’t work. Always check the date on yeast and test it out before mixing into anything.
Flatten, fold, rotate, repeat.
[ 2 ] Kneading
Kneading develops gluten in the dough and gives it that chewy, pizza crust bite. To knead, push the heel of your hand forward and down into the dough to flatten it out. Then lift the far end up towards you and fold it back down onto itself. Rotate the dough 90° and then knead it again. Keep flattening, folding, rotating, and repeating until the dough is smooth(ish) and no longer has any loose bits or raw flour. That’s when it is ready to rest and rise.
[ 3 ] Letting it rise
The dough will double in size in about an hour with fast-acting yeast. You will also notice a significantly smoother surface after it has risen. This is because the flour has hydrated - i.e., soaked up some of the fat and water in the dough.
Pre-rise.
Post-rise.
[ 4 ] Rolling it out
Dump the dough out and cut it into quarters to make four small pizzas (or in half to make two larger, rectangular pizzas on sheet pans). Roll each quarter into a ball and lay it flat on your work surface. Use a rolling pin (or a wine bottle) to flatten it out into a roughly 10-inch circle. Push the rolling pin away from your body, flattening the dough. Rotate the dough about 1/4 turn (45°) and repeat. This helps keep a circular shape, but it doesn’t have to be perfect! The final dough should be a little less than 1/4” thick.
Four equal parts for four pizzas.
[ 5 ] Making a crust
Use your fingers to work your way around each pizza, folding about 1/4” to 1/2” of the edge over onto itself - creating a little ridge around the perimeter of the pizza to help contain the sauce and toppings. It will flatten out a bit as the pizza cooks and make a nice crust.
[ 6 ] Topping
We used sliced mushrooms, red bell pepper, anchovies, diced salami, fresh mozzarella, and a little jarred sauce on our pizzas; and finished them with basil, a little lemon juice, and freshly grated parm. Red pepper flakes are also great if you like heat. It helps to freeze fresh mozzarella for about 30 minutes before shredding to get nice, consistent shreds. It is a very wet cheese and tends to fall apart otherwise. If you’re really feeling adventurous, you could make a little homemade tomato sauce, as chronicled here.
[ 7 ] Baking
Preheat the oven to 500° F and place oven racks in the lowest positions. The closer the rack is to the bottom of the oven, the faster the pizza will cook. I typically bake two at a time and keep an eye on the lowest pizza in the oven as it will be ready first. You can also swap the pizza’s positions halfway through cooking.
