Pizza Woes...then along came Emeril Lagasse and Ina Garten and their pizza dough recipes

Well, since moving to the little town we now inhabit we have missed the convenience of having some of our favorite pizza places nearby, like Papa John's and Cici's. At present, we have 2 options close enough for delivery - Mr. Jim's and Domino's.

Domino's - nooooo likey.

Mr. Jim's - horrible customer service, good pizza. It's a shame. OVER and OVER, we gave them "one more chance" because we like the pizza A LOT, but the last few times we ordered were the final straws. Part of the order was very overcooked. The most recent, it was so hard (breadsticks) that the children couldn't even bite into them. Also, they kept forgetting to send the sauce w/the breadsticks...ummmm, we kind of want the sauce for the breadsticks...it's part of the breadstick experience...

The last time we ordered, I specifically told them that they'd forgotten the sauce last time and would they PLEASE make sure that it was with the order this time. The guy says "no problem."

Order arrives...no sauce at all. I refused to pay the guy and instead told him to wait while I called the store. Talked with some guy, who claims there's no note on the order saying to make sure the sauce is there, but instead that it says "don't send any sauce" - how on earth the guy got that backward after I repeated it twice, I will never know except that it is just a continuance of the incompetence we've experienced since the first few times we ordered. Driver guy talks to the guy at the store and is told to come back for more sauce and takes off...with my check. Guy on phone says he shouldn't have taken the check...agggggh...and CKB takes over on the phone at this point demanding to talk to the manager. Phone guy says no manager there, but will give him a message to call us to "straighten this all out." Uh huh. It's been over a month - have we received a call? What do you think? No.

Phone guy shows up later w/sauce, hmm, the food is all gone by then, but thanks. The food is free for the night. About time they did something right around there, but we would've been happy to just have the sauce WITH the food for once.

Have we ordered from Mr. Jim's again? No. Will we? No. We tried Domino's again in desperation, but that just confirmed what we already knew - Nooooo likey.

So...for some reason I decided to try making our own pizza tonight. I tried two different pizza dough recipes from the foodnetwork site - one from Ina Garten and one from Emeril Lagasse. The verdict is in - Emeril's recipe won. Ina's was ok, but just tasted more like bread...yes, I know, the crust/pizza dough is bread, but well... nevermind...we preferred the Emeril recipe.

I made 4 pizzas, 1 had fresh mozzarella, Prego sauce, and some grated mozzarella on top. YUMMMMMM! That was my favorite and CKB's as well.

The fave:






Then I made 3 more, 1 with NO SAUCE, grated mozzarella and a little bit of grated cheddar. This one was gone fast - somehow the children have become NO SAUCE people...I don't know where they got that from...ahem...(as a child, I didn't like much sauce...might be my fault...maybe...).

The next was NO SAUCE, grated mozzarella, 1/2 pepperoni and 1/2 black olive. This one didn't last long either.

The last was an "experiment" - NO SAUCE and gorgonzola cheese. CKB tried it first and decided that it wasn't a winner - I declined trying it after seeing his reaction and we just finished up the others. I'll stick with having gorgonzola at Johnny Carino's on my pasta!

Here are those 3:




So, we just might make our own pizzas from now on! The recipe for the dough was pretty simple and I somehow managed to get the yeast/warm water part right for a change - that's usually my downfall in any bread making endeavor.

The fact that all the pizza was eaten, except the gorgonzola, says it all :) Yay! We have a solution to our pizza woes! No more Domino's desperation. I asked the children to raise their hands if they liked the pizza tonight (yes, to raise their hands, you have NO IDEA the kind of volume this bunch can put out when they all holler ME!!!! at once!) and, drumroll please, they ALL raised their hands (including CKB) :)

Now, if a Papa John's comes to town...well, I might rethink this making our own business, but for now, I think we have a solution! Hooray!

So, now that you know ours - what's your favorite pizza dough recipe? And/Or, favorite pizza place to order from?