Salsa Quitza – Tuesdays With Dorie

I think when I made this recipe it can officially be considered baking improvisation. Initially I wasn’t going to attempt it because it required the use of a bread machine which I don’t own but I figured I’d give it a shot – thought I’d make the dough the same way I’ve made bread or gnocchi. It was actually pretty easy to put together and it rose just like bread so I figured the hard part was over. Not quite. I’m not sure why but when I read the recipe I thought it called for a nine inch springform pan which I own and not the twelve inch springform pan that I do not own. I figured out my mistake when I was getting ready to put the quitza together so I opted for making a flat pizza which was one of the options listed. So, I got the baking stone out, put it into the oven and formed the quitza on my trusty pizza peel. Everything was fine until I realized that my baking stone, and my oven, were too small to handle something this large. So, I made the crust a little thicker and slid it into the preheated oven. Parts of the quitza were still kind of hanging over the side so for the first few minutes I had to keep shoving it back onto the stone until it was firm enough to stay in there on its’ own.  In the end everything turned out fine – a little thicker than I’d planned but very tasty. Here are a couple of photos of the intermediate steps.

The quitza dough formed into a flat pizza:

The dough with all the toppings:

I think next time I do this, I’m going to split the dough into two portions and make a couple of smaller flat pizzas which my oven will hold. I have to admit though it was kind of fun doing the large one – made me feel a little like MacGyver.