Friday, February 26, 2010

Panchetta, Mozzarella and Basil Pizza Bites

I've become obsessed with cooking, and trying new recipes.
Last night I made an Italian style Goulash, and today it was Panchetta Mozzarella and Basil Pizza bites - those two recipes are thanks to http://fortheloveofcooking-recipes.blogspot.com/ - my new bible.
The recipes are all amazing, and totally easy to make!

I made the pizza bites as a late-lunch/mid-afternoon snack, and they were AMAZING. I adapted the recipe for the mozzarella and panchetta, you can really add anything you want to! I heated up some of my Basil pizza sauce to dip them in - BELLESSIMO!
It was so good. They were a perfect snack out on the terrace in this gorgeous spring weather.

Enough raving about them, here's the recipe (the way I made them)

1 ball mozzarella cheese
1/2 container of refrigerated pre-made pizza dough
5-6 tufts of basil - chiffonade
1 small package of cubed panchetta

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F (which I guessed was 375 degrees C)
Line a cake pan with tin foil and drip olive oil and spread with a paper towl - remove excess oil

Let pizza dough sit for 20 minutes out of fridge, then pull about a golf ball size and flatten it.
Rip into mozzarella and put as much as desired onto dough
sprinkle a few cubes of panchetta, and a bit of the chiffonaded basil.
fold everything into the dough - like a pillow - and place into cake pan - roll dough ball in oil to coat.
Make as many as desired
(I made 12 using the 1/2 container of pizza dough, 1/2 the container of pancetta, and the whole ball of mozzarella - I snacked on the mozzarella as I was making them ;])
Then cover with fresh black pepper and a little salt - to taste

Bake for about 20 minutes - or until the dough is golden.

I also had a little pizza sauce on the burner and it made for a great dipping sauce for the pizza bites!

Ciao!

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