tomato, mozzarella, garlic, and basil, and carmelized onion, fig, and gorgonzola pizza bianca

tomato, mozzarella, garlic, and basil, and carmelized onion, fig, and gorgonzola pizza bianca, originally uploaded by aarn! +28th August, 2008+.

made a two topping pizza, the first half topped with sliced tomato, fresh chopped basil, chunks of garlic, and thin sliced fresh mozzarella, and the second half had caramelized onions, fresh sliced black mission figs, and crumbled gorgonzola cheese. made the dough with a modified recipe from cook's illustrated. mixed 3c. of flour into 1 2/3c. room temp water, 2 1/4t. table salt, 1pkg instant yeast, 1 1/2t. sugar, 5T. EVO, and 2T. rosemary leaves (chopped up somewhat small and then rubbed in the palm of your hand until it smells nice). let that sit oiled in the bowl for an hour or so and then transferred to a large oiled 1" deep baking sheet. Let rise in the baking sheet until the dough is almost at the edge of the top of the baking sheet, then put it in a 400-degree oven for 10-minutes (top rack), with an oven safe bowl with about a 1/4-inch of water in it on the bottom rack (to create some humidity and let the dough rise more). after 10-minutes, the water dish was removed from the oven and the dough was brushed lightly with olive oil and the toppings were put on, then it was baked for another 8 or 10-minutes, until the bottom of the crust was barely brown. this is a relatively liquid dough, so it makes it hard to work with, but it produces a crazy-good pizza result, and could also be a quick focaccia.

[notes: none of the pictures really turned out that hot, so a few were just kind of sewed together.]