Christina's Italian Sausage Pizza as seen on Masterchef Australia 2013

Makes: 4 x 23cm pizzas

Ingredients

Pizza dough

• 280ml warm water
• 3g fresh yeast
• 5g gluten flour (optional)*
• 1 teaspooncaster sugar
• 1 teaspoon fine sea salt
• 550g 00 pizza flour, plus extra, for dusting
• 3 teaspoons extra virgin olive oil, plus extra, for greasing

Pizza topping

• 20g butter
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 4 pork sausages, casings removed, roughly crumbled
• 1 small onion, finely chopped
• 1 garlic clove, finely chopped
• 1 roasted peeled capsicum, finely diced
• ½ teaspoonsmoked paprika
• 1/3 cup roughly chopped parsley
• Coarse semolina, for dusting
• 2/3 cup (200g) tomato passata
• Chilli oil, to drizzle
  1 cup (240g) Perfect Italiano Mozzarella, coarsely grated
  

Method

Pizza Dough

1. Place water, yeast and gluten flour in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a dough hook. Mix vigorously until the mixture is full of bubbles, yeast is dissolved and well combined. Add sugar, salt and 450g flour to the bowl, and mix until the dough starts getting smooth, then add remaining flour to the bowl. Mix until the dough has formed and is smooth.
2. With the mixer running, add the oil, mixing to combine. Dust dough with flour, then stop the machine.
3. Place a tea towel over the dough and set aside to prove for 1 hour.
4. Knock back the dough during this time if it is rising out of the bowl. After 1 hour, empty the bowl onto a clean work surface, dusted with flour, and knock the dough back, then roll into 190g balls. Place on lightly greased large trays, dust with flour, cover with a tea towel and set aside for 30 minutes or until doubled in size.

*Gluten flour is used in pizza dough to increase the chewiness but is not essential

Pizza topping

5. Heat butter and oil in a deep frying pan over medium heat. Add onion and garlic and cook for about 5 minutes or until softened. Add sausage and cook for 5 minutes until sausage is lightly browned, slightly breaking down the meat with a wooden spoon. Add capsicum and paprika and cook for 3 minutes or until sausage meat is almost cooked. Transfer mixture to a heatproof bowl, set aside to cool completely, then stir through parsley.
6. Meanwhile, place a pizza stone, tray or terracotta tile in the oven and set to 220C-240C fan-forced. Pad out dough ball with your fingertips, gently stretching out base with your hands, leaving a rim for the crust. Transfer dough base to a semolina-dusted board.
7. Top base with 2 tablespoons passata, then drizzle with chilli oil. Scatter 1/8 of the Perfect Italian Mozzarella over base, ¼ of the sausage mixture, then scatter with another 1/8 of the Perfect Italian Mozzarella. Slide pizza from the board to the hot pizza stone and cook for 4-5 minutes or until golden brown. You may need to rotate the pizza to cook evenly. Remove pizza from oven and serve. Repeat with remaining bases..