Pizza Rustica

Tuesday with Dorie

Thank you to Emily from Capital Region Dining Blog and Raelynn from The Place They Call Home for hosting this week's recipe. Pizza Rustica is by contributing baker Nick Malgieri. It is a surprising pizza recipe because it has savory ingredients for the filling, but a sweet dough for the crust. I had my doubts about it when I saw that there were three different types of cheese and not a tomato in sight, but I wanted to give the recipe a try without tweaking the ingredients too much and as much as I wanted to add some tomatoes or a little bit of sauce, I resisted the impulse, and instead, added some minced green onion and substituted little chunks of ham for the prosciutto.

I made the dough Sunday morning and put the two rounds of dough in the refrigerator to chill even though the recipe says that you can use it right away. We left for the afternoon and didn't get back until late, but I went ahead and assembled the pizza pie even though I knew it would be too late to eat it for dinner by the time it finished baking. The dough was a little difficult for me to work with because it was warm in my kitchen and the dough got really soft. I put the dough-filled pie plate in the fridge to chill while I cut the strips for the top. The filling came together easily. After 30 minutes in my oven at 350 degrees, I checked on it and noticed that the edges were getting brown, but the middle was still light-colored, so I put my pie crust shield around it (John picked this up for me at a garage sale and it has come in so handy - beats tearing off pieces of foil and trying to work it around the edge of the pie) and let it bake for another 10 minutes.

At 10:30 at night I pulled it from the oven and let it cool on the cooling rack, wrapped it in foil and put it in the fridge. When I got home from work on Monday, I sliced some pieces and popped them in the microwave to heat them up. These slices were our afternoon snacks. The combination of sweet and savory is so wonderful in this pizza. John thought it tasted like a quiche, but I disagreed. I liked this so much better than quiche. I fixed a green salad with homemade ranch dressing and served more slices of pizza rustica for dinner. It is perfect as a snack, for lunch, or for dinner. This would also be perfect to serve for Easter or at any gathering because you can make it ahead, reheat, and serve.

Let's talk about the dough for a second. John helped me cut the strips for the lattice top and not wanting to waste the dough, he rolled them up like a lasagna roll and we baked it in the oven. He said it was the best 'roll' he has eaten! Looks like I will be making more of the dough for Easter dinner rolls.

Visit Tuesdays with Dorie to see the other pizza rusticas. You can get the recipe over on Emily's and Raelynn's blogs.