Caramelized fennel, pear and blue cheese pizza with a walnut, garlic and parmesan spread

Best pizza dough, best toppings

Published originally on my blog on 6 March 2016

One of my most popular recipes here on the blog is my pizza dough and it makes me happy that so many people are enjoying it and making it for their family and friends. That’s what food blogging is all about for me. Sharing a recipe, releasing it out into this vast world of the internet without any expectations, and seeing people discovering it, using it and making it part of their cooking repertoire.

I make pizza fairly regularly and I always use the same recipe. It has never disappointed me and I have never felt the urge to dabble with another one. I hate ready-made pizza dough or pre-baked pizza bases so whenever we crave pizza, I pull out my stand mixer and make a batch. As I did yet again the other day.

We are usually purists when it comes to pizza, smearing the dough with tomato sauce (I swear by my recipe) and topping it with salami (soutzouki when I’m in Greece is never absent from my pizza or peinirli), different types of ham and cheeses, and various seasonal vegetables from time to time.
I rarely deviate from this, but when I do, I try to find ways in which to make it fun and different.

In this case, I smeared the dough with a walnut, garlic and parmesan spread which is highly addictive, I thinly sliced a fennel bulb and caramelized it in date syrup and olive oil and scattered it on top, added some crisp slices of fresh pear and crumbled some rich, creamy and tangy blue cheese over the top.

When it came out of the oven, I crumbled some more blue cheese to add a different texture and flavor, I ground some fresh black pepper, scattered a handful of fresh rocket leaves over the top and drizzled with a little olive oil for extra lusciousness.

The dough is all that it should be; perfectly bubbly, thin and crunchy with large holes and a soft, fluffy and chewy interior, while the toppings provide all sorts of flavors and textures. Sweet, umami, crispy, salty, nutty, fresh, creamy, caramelized, earthy, peppery. A marvelous pizza, definitely worth trying. Hope you enjoy it as much as we have.

Caramelized fennel, pear and blue cheese pizza with a walnut, garlic and parmesan spread

I love Roquefort cheese and that’s what I used here, but any sort of blue cheese would work.

A pizza stone makes all the difference with home-baked pizza because you get a beautifully charred and crusty pizza. I always use one, but if you don’t have it, a baking sheet will do.

I used a mandolin to slice the fennel and pears because it’s easier and faster than using a knife, but a well sharpened knife will also do the trick.