Pizza! Pizza! #2

Homemade pizza is cheaper than takeout and easy to make. And of course, one way to save money by making your pizza at home is to buy your ingredients in bulk. I often buy my yeast, flour, sauce and cheese in bulk from from Sam's Club. 

First thing you need to make pizza is the crust. My favorite pizza crust recipe can be found here. 

One of the secrets to making a good pizza dough is to let the dough rise slowly in the refrigerator overnight. This time of slow yeast activation allows the dough to develop a much better flavor than it would if you just used the dough directly after mixing. 

Sometimes, in order to save money by using what I have on hand, I use other items for the pizza crust. These items include...

English Muffins
Bagels
French or Italian Bread
Flour or CornTortillas
Flat Out Wraps

Again, using what  I have on hand or have bought on sale saves me more money over buying a ready made pizza crust or takeout pizza. 
 
 The next thing you will need for your pizza is the sauce. I have used many different things for the sauce on our pizzas. 

I have used tomato paste, tomato sauce, ketchup, crushed tomatoes, spaghetti sauce, canned and jarred pizza sauce, Amy Dacyczyn's homemade pizza sauce (which I found to be very bitter), etc. Again, using whatever I have on hand to save money. 

Another thing I sometimes do for pizza sauce,  is to buy the number ten can of crushed tomatoes, tomato sauce, or pizza sauce from Sam's Club, although I did not see any pizza sauce on my last trip to Sam's this past week.  

One way to save money with the number ten can is to figure out how much sauce you like on your pizzas and freeze portions in that quantity. I like my pizza with very little sauce, so I use a mini muffin pan to freeze correct pizza size portions and then store these in my freezer. 

Homemade Taco Pizza

Here are some other posts from me about pizza you may enjoy reading:

Pizza! Pizza!


Saturday


Saturday Night Pizza

And of course, last week I shared how I make pizza kits for the freezer. 

What is your favorite way to save money on pizza? 

Belinda

Saturday Night Dinner ~ Free Pizza

Papa Johns Pizza recently had a promotion asking people to pick heads or tails on the Super Bowl coin toss for a chance to win a free pizza. I picked heads and called it right, so yesterday we were able to pick up a free pizza for dinner. How cool is that?

 Remember to like your favorite companies on Facebook for your chance to win prizes and coupons like this.

Belinda
© Belinda Richardson and Frugal Workshop, 2011-2013.
“Use it up, wear it out, make it do, do without”

Saturday Evening

My menu plan for this week called for homemade pizza tonight. I made my own pizza dough using this recipe. I used mozzarella cheese, which I had left over from another recipe, which was stored in the freezer, and I opened an Institutional size can of spaghetti sauce, which I divided up into smaller containers and put three of those in the freezer for another use later. I topped it with pepperoni and black olives. It tasted good, my family enjoyed it, and I didn't spend any money on takeout pizza. 

Today was a very productive day here. I woke up early and got started right away doing laundry. I then cleaned out the refrigerator and made soup, boiled eggs, and cleaned all the dishes from that project. Afterwards my daughter and I gathered up all the garbage and took it the garbage drop off center. We are very fortunate as our county drop off center does not charge us to drop off garbage. We are the only county in Tennessee which has free garbage service, although we do have to haul it ourselves. 

Afterwards we made a run to Super Saver for several items including milk, bread, cheese, and corn, which was on sale for 50¢ a can and since I was out of corn, I decided to pick up six cans to add to my pantry. My total at Super Saver was $27.02. Afterwards we drove across the road to fill up our gas tank. Gas was selling for $3.21 a gallon, but I used my Bi-Lo Bonus Card and was able to lower the price to $3.06 per gallon and saved 15¢ per gallon. 

The groceries and gas were the only money I spent all week. I worked two days this week and took my lunch and drinks to work both days. I ate breakfast and dinner at home and did not spend any money buying drinks or snacks or anything. I didn't even buy the newspaper for the sale ads on Wednesday. I just looked up the grocery store ads online.  We were very frugal here this week and I hope you had a very frugal week in your home too. :)

Belinda
© Belinda Richardson and Frugal Workshop, 2011-2013.
“Use it up, wear it out, make it do, do without”

Pizza! Pizza!

Last week while I was shopping at Sam's Club, I picked up some of the ingredients to make homemade pizzas.  On Sunday, I whipped up a double batch of pizza dough. The pizza dough recipe I use will make two cookie sheet sized pizzas or twelve after school snack sized pizzas. After I finished the dough, I made the two pizzas you seen in the photo above and that is what we had for lunch on Sunday. There was enough pizza left over for lunch on Monday and Tuesday as well. On Sunday, I put the second half of the dough in the refrigerator and waited until I had a day off to work with it. 

Here is what I picked up at Sam's Club for pizzas last week:

5 pounds Mozzarella Cheese - $11.98

3 pounds Pepperoni - $7.98
Black Olives 6.25

I also opened one of the Industrial sized cans of pizza sauce I blogged about here. I froze the rest of the sauce that I did not use for later.  And even after making all this pizza, I still have plenty of cheese, pepperoni, sauce, and black olives to use in other recipes.

The recipe I use for pizza crust is one I found years ago from the Friendly Freezer Yahoo group and was created by the list owner, Robbyn Snyder. Her website is no longer online, but if you use the Internet Wayback machine you can find it here: Pizza Page for Robbyn

Garlic Pizza Crust
Recipe By : Robbyn Serving Size : 12

 

Ingredients:

2 cups tepid water (90*)
1/2 cup oil
3 cloves crushed garlic
5 1/2 to 6 cups flour
1 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons sugar
2 tablespoons yeast

Directions:

 

Dissolve yeast in water and add sugar.

Add oil and salt and garlic.

Mix in 3 cups flour and mix well. 

Add remaining flour and knead till smooth.

Allow to rise twice in the bowl. Punch down.

Oil baking sheets, use hands to press out to edges.

Add sauce and toppings.

Bake at 425* for 20 min.

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As I mentioned earlier, this recipe will also make 12 after school sized snacks, which is what I worked on today since I was not subbing. I set the dough on my counter and cut it into 12 equal size pieces and then place them individually into an eight inch round baking pan to spread the dough out. I make four of them at a time since I have four pans and they will all fit in the oven at the same time. Here is what they look like before they go into the oven:

Of course, if you decide to make these you are going to add the toppings you like. I love pepperoni and black olives. I love good Italian sausage too when I can find it. Here is what they look like when they are cooling on my baking racks:

As I mentioned earlier, I made twelve of these today, and Mom and I had one for lunch. I also have another one in the refrigerator for my daughter for after school. After they cool, I place each individual pizza in its own one gallon size Ziploc bag and stack them in the freezer. 

Here they are stacked up on my counter:

And here they are stacked in the freezer, right on top of a Tony's frozen pizza. Oh, the irony, lol. ;)

This to me is the ultimate convenience food. To have homemade pizzas already cooked and ready to just warm up feels like a luxury to me. I wish I had the energy to have them in my freezer regularly, but they get eaten up pretty fast. Sort of like how homemade bread gets eaten faster than store bought bread. 

What is one of your homemade convenience foods?

Belinda

© Belinda Richardson and Frugal Workshop, 2012-2016.

“Use it up, wear it out, make it do, do without”

Saturday Night Pizza

While I was shopping at Sam's Club on Sunday, I picked up the ingredients to make homemade pizzas as well, so last night we had homemade pizza for dinner.

5 pounds Mozzarella Cheese - $11.98

3 pounds Pepperoni - $7.98

We made three pizzas last night and still have plenty of ingredients to make more pizza. The 3 pound bag of pepperoni will last me a long time as I've only used about 20 pepperonis per pizza and 3 pounds of pepperoni is a lot. Will definitely be freezing some of this. 

The recipe I use for pizza crust in one I found years ago from the Friendly Freezer Yahoo group and was created by the list owner, Robbyn Snyder. Her website is no longer online, but if you use the Internet Wayback machine you can find it here: Pizza Page for Robbyn

Robbyn's Garlic Pizza Crust

Recipe By : Robbyn Serving Size : 12

2 cups tepid water (90*)
1/2 cup oil
3 cloves crushed garlic
5 1/2 to 6 cups flour
1 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons sugar
2 tablespoons yeast

Directions:

 

Dissolve yeast in water and add sugar.

Add oil and salt and garlic.

Mix in 3 cups flour and mix well. 

Add remaining flour and knead till smooth.

Allow to rise twice in the bowl. Punch down.

Oil baking sheets, use hands to press out to edges.

Add sauce and toppings.

Bake at 425* for 20 min.

This makes 2 cookie sheet sized or 12 after school snack size.

I've made the 12 after school snack size pizzas using this recipe before. I made them using an 8 inch round cake pan, and then placed each individual pizza in a one gallon size Ziploc bag and stacked them in the freezer. Next time I make them I'll take a picture for the blog. :) 

Belinda
 © Belinda Richardson and Frugal Workshop, 2011-2015 and beyond.
“Use it up, wear it out, make it do, do without”