A very easy pizza

Since following a Jamie Oliver recipe several years ago, I no longer make a tomato sauce pizza topping. I simply finely chop a few tomatoes - skin, seeds and all - mix them with salt, pepper and a drizzle each of olive oil and balsamic vinegar and leave them for a couple of hours. The  result - more of a salsa than a sauce - makes a lovely vibrant, fresh topping for a pizza and is incredibly simple.

The other day, I made pizza and it was almost less trouble than picking up the phone to order a takeaway. First I made a basic pizza dough in my bread machine, using the instructions in the manual. While it was mixing, I made the above tomato topping and sliced and fried a few mushrooms that were hanging around in the fridge.

I divided the  dough into two rounds. One I cooked naked (the dough, not me) to freeze as a ready made base for a future pizza. I topped the other with the mushrooms and tomatoes, then scattered on some dried oregano and a few crushed chilli flakes. I roughly tore a ball of mozzarella over it and drizzled the edges with chilli oil, then rested it for 20 minutes or so and baked it.  Here is the uncooked pizza.

As soon as it came out of the oven, I scattered over some home grown baby rocket leaves and flakes of Parmesan, and it was ready to serve.

Accompanied, of course, by some lovely home grown green salad, grown, like the rocket,  by my husband Mark who blogs about gardening and food over at Marksvegplot