The most basic homemade margarita pizza

The margarita pizza is the pinnacle of pizzas. It is literally better than the sum of its parts. Here is how you approach it if you are a beginner.

tl;dr: get the dough ready, heat up the oven, add the marinara, add the mozzarella, and bake it. finish it with fresh basil and a bit of olive oil

Problems of baking your own pizza and how to solve them

1. The heat of the oven is one of the most important components. In a real wood-fired oven, the temperatures reach up to 500 degrees Celcius. No normal home appliance type of oven can reach that.
   1. Your first alternative is a pizza stone. You will need to put the stone in the oven and let it heat up for like 30-45 minutes (or whatever the stone says). This is a great heat conductor for the pizza, so whenever you put your dough in the oven it will cook faster
   2. Your second alternative is a pizza iron which is apparently better at conducting heat – don’t know, have never tried it.
   3. The third alternative would be just nothing. Nothing works as well. It will not be as perfect, but it will still be delicious
2. The fresh mozzarella is very liquidy. If you want a dryer pizza, then take the fresh mozzarella out of the container, wrap them in a few paper towels and place them in a fridge for about 1 hour.
3. The marinara sauce is one of those things that can make a difference. Check my homemade marinara sauce recipe. Don’t make pizza with store-bought sauce.

Ingredients

1. Pizza Dough
2. homemade marinara sauce
3. fresh mozzarella
4. a few basil leaves
5. olive oil, salt and pepper

Margarita pizza recipe

1. Heat up the oven on your maximum setting.
2. If you have a pizza stone, add it in the oven now. You will need to wait for it to actually warm up properly.
3. Start working the dough and open it with the tips of your finger in circular motions. Now if you don’t feel comfortable doing this, no worries, there is no wrong way of doing it – you will get used to it. The core of it all is to just open it and maintain the same thickness all around. It will cook more evenly
4. Before you do anything, you will need a shovel-like tool to drop the pizza. If you do not have that, then place the dough in some parchment paper. You will lose a bit of heat, but what can you do, eh.
5. Spread some marinara
6. Add the mozzarella and speed it around
7. Add a bit of salt
8. If you have the shovel-like tool which would act as a makeshift peel, then peel the pizza through and directly in the oven. If not, just place the parchment paper pizza directly in the oven.
9. Bake for 10-15 minutes, or till the dough is cooked and the cheese is melted.
10. Remove, add some olive oil and cut it in pieces.
11. That’s it.