To Bake or to Garden (Calzones)
I was torned last night between wanting to get out in the garden and weed (now that we finally had rain) or make something wonderful for supper. Inspiration came when I realized I that I had the perfect trifecta of meats in the refrigerator for a tasty calzone — pepperoni, salami and ham. Maybe I could do both. I could work in the garden while my trusty bread machine worked on the dough! I started to look online for a good dough recipe. (Which is fine, but a person can get stuck reading recipe after recipe.) Finally, throwing caution to the wind, I put some classic ingredients in my bread machine and out the door I went.
I had just a bit of weeding left in my daylily garden when I came in to check on the bread machine’s progress. 11 minutes left. Back outside to finish up. It was so nice to see my daylilies, all in bud, with no weeds at their feet. Now to give my hands a good scrub and see how my dough came out.
I turned the dough out onto a lightly floured board and punched it down. Then I divided it in to 8 pieces and shaped into balls. I covered them with a towel, so they wouldn’t dry out. Now to make the filling. Ham cubes, chopped up salami and pepperoni went into a bowl along with tomato sauce and pizza seasoning. I gave it a quick stir and went back to form the dough.
The dough was easy to work with. Soft, but resilient. Each dough ball was rolled out into a circle to approximately seven inches in diameter. A quarter cup of meat filling plus a small handful of mozzarella cheese went in the middle. I folded the dough over around the filling, and pinched the edges tight to make a good seal. It took two cookie sheets to hold all eight calzones. I placed them into a 400° F oven to bake, it took about 25 minutes to reach a nice golden brown.
They turned out beautiful. The bread inside was not soggy and it had a great taste and texture. Not only did I have my “wonderful supper” but leftovers for lunch and a few to freeze for later. Plus, I had a new dough recipe of my own!
The best part about calzones is that there is no limit to the type of filling you can put inside your bread pocket. I will leave that to your imagination. You will need two cups of filling to make eight calzones.
Calzone Dough (using bread machine to process dough)
Makes eight calzones
- 1 1/4 cups warm water
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- 2 tablespoons honey
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 1/4 cup unbleached flour
- 1 1/4 cups bread flour
- 1 1/4 cups semolina flour
- 2 1/4 teaspoons quick acting yeast
Pour the water, olive oil and honey into the bread machine pan. In a separate bowl, add each of the flours and salt. stir with a whisk to give them a quick blend and then add to the wet ingredients. Sprinkle the yeast on top. Set the bread machine to the dough cycle and start. Check to make sure all ingredients have incorporated nicely and that dough is not too dry or sticky.
When dough cycle is finished, turn dough out onto lightly floured board. Punch dough down to remove air. Divide dough into eight even pieces and shape into balls. Roll each dough ball into a 7-8 inch circle. Place 1/4 cup of preferred filling into the center, keeping filling away from the edges. Fold dough over and pinch edges together to seal tightly. Place on cookie sheet, at least one inch apart to allow for dough rise when baking.
Bake at 400° F for approximately 20-25 minutes or until golden brown. Serve with favorite dipping sauce that corresponds to filling.
Sunny Diversions 