Pepperoni pizza on a rainy night.

A little about the Portuguese Broa dough used for this crust. The Broa dough is part cornmeal and makes a wonderful pizza crust thin or thick as well as the hot pocket wrapper or a nice crusty bread to go with soup or stew. I mix 1 cup cornmeal with 2 1/4 cups bread flour, 1 3/4 cups water, 1 packet yeast, 1 1/2 tsp sea salt – mix well, cover and let rise for 8 hours, then put it in crock in the refrigerator for up to 7 days. I grab a small peach sized piece for a hot pocket, an small apple sized amount for a one person pizza or a large apple sized piece for a mini-boule bread. The dough is VERY moist. I add enough flour to hands, board and/or rolling pin to shape the dough.

Hot pockets bake for 16 minutes.
Pizza – I pre-bake the crust for 7 minutes, add toppings and bake for another 7-8 minutes
A small boule or ciabatta for 20 minutes.

All at 470 with a pan full of water on a separate shelf to crisp up the hot pocket or little bread.

***YIKES!…one more “detail”… for a boule or ciabatta or any shaped bread, shape the dough and let it “rise” for 30-40 minutes. The “rise” for this high moisture dough is more of a flatten out than a rise. Slash the puddle of dough several times before putting it in the oven. Automagically, that little puddle of dough will rise during baking and come out looking like real bread! No rise for pizza crust or hot pockets/calzone.