Why spend a fortune buying pizza, when you can make it yourself really cheaply and save a fortune!
Ever wondered why pizza restaurants offer so many deals? It's very simple, it's pretty cheap to make a pizza, and the margins a restaurant can make on this popular fast food can be huge!!
I've worked in a pizza restaurant, and I've seen what a pizza actually costs to make and what they sell for, and the difference is huge! It doesn't mean you're being ripped off, of course; every business is there to make a profit, and these days with the escalating costs of raw ingredients, power, gas and staffing costs, never mind the costs of renting a property and paying taxes, that profit gets eaten up pretty quickly, but on the whole, in the restaurant world, the humble pizza is a profitable item to put on the menu.
As a pizza fan, pizza is certainly something I often choose when hungry and want a quick meal, more often than not, ordered from a restaurant; I'm getting hungry just thinking about pizza, but even with the multiple deals being offered by restaurants, I'm always annoyed at myself when the pizza arrives, as I don't think I've spent under £20 on a pizza deal for years, and actually, that's a nuts amount of money to spend on something that I can buy from a supermarket far cheaper, or better still make myself for massively less!
Having worked in the pizza restaurant industry for many years, I've made the odd few thousand pizzas in my restaurant career and can knock up a pizza dough from scratch in no time, plus of course, a tasty tomato sauce as well after all that's a big part of the flavour of a pizza isn't it, and it's so easy to make, not to mention cheap!
I love pizza and making pizza so much that I had a wood-burning pizza oven built into my garden back in 2013, before the pizza ovens you can buy in all the shops were so readily available! It cost me a small fortune, but it was back when I actually had money and could afford that sort of luxury garden fixture! It was massive but pretty awesome; I had fun pizza-making in the garden!
Sadly, when I got divorced, I left that home, and the house was sold. However, it did increase the value of the house, so it was not a total waste of money, but I do miss that oven!
I don't suggest buying a wood-burning pizza oven for your garden; if you have an oven in your home, you're all set to make homemade pizza, which tastes better than supermarket or takeaway pizza and can cost far less. It's also fun for the kids to get involved in. They love making their own pizzas, and it's a valuable lesson in being more creative in the kitchen for them.
Below is my recipe and method for making pizza and pizza sauce at home. It's easy, delicious, and works every time!
Making Your Own Pizza
Pizza dough Ingredients:
500g plain or bread flour
5g sugar
5g salt
1 package of active dry yeast
350 ml of warm water
30 ml olive oil (can be skipped)
Instructions:
In a large mixing bowl, combine the warm water and sugar. Stir until the sugar is dissolved. Sprinkle the yeast over the water and let it sit for about 5 minutes or until it becomes foamy.
In a separate bowl, whisk together the flour and salt. If you have an electric food mixer, this step is easier.
Add the flour mixture to the yeast mixture. Stir with a wooden spoon until a shaggy dough forms. If you have a machine, add the dry ingredients to the mixer bowl and slowly add the water until the ingredients are well combined.
Transfer the dough onto a floured surface and knead for about 5-7 minutes until smooth and elastic. If the dough is too sticky, add a little more flour, about 1 tablespoon at a time, while kneading. With an electric mixer, beat it on a medium setting for about 5 minutes.
Shape the dough into a ball and place it in a greased bowl. Cover the bowl with a clean kitchen towel or plastic wrap and let the dough rise in a warm place for about 1-2 hours or until it doubles in size.
After the dough has risen, punch down to release any air bubbles. Transfer it back to the floured surface and knead for another minute. Then, pop it back in the bowl, cover, and let it rise again for about 30 minutes.
Divide the dough into six equal portions/balls, pop them on a tray or plate, cover again, and leave for 30 minutes. You can skip this bit if you are short of time, but it does produce a better pizza, in my opinion.
Roll out each portion of dough into your desired pizza shape and thickness. You can use a rolling pin or simply stretch the dough with your hands. This recipe is designed to make a thinner-style pizza; for thicker pizzas, it will make 4, not 6.
Transfer the rolled-out dough onto a greased or parchment-lined baking sheet or pizza stone.
Brush the surface of the dough with olive oil to prevent it from becoming soggy.
Add your favourite pizza toppings, such as tomato sauce, cheese, vegetables, and meats. I like to use up what I have in the fridge for toppings, especially the last bits of cheese and veggies. This saves money and prevents food waste.
Bake the pizza in the pre-heated oven for about 12-15 minutes or until the crust turns golden brown and the cheese is bubbly and melted.
Remove the pizza from the oven and let it cool for a few minutes before slicing and serving.
When I made this dough, the cost was around £1. I used own-brand flour from Tesco and a single package of dried yeast, again, own-brand Tesco. I already had the olive oil, but it's included in the cost of what I used in the recipe. I had sugar and salt, and the water was from the kitchen tap.
I like to make my own pizza sauce. For convenience, you can, of course, buy this in a supermarket; Tesco offers its own brand 200g jar of pizza sauce for £1.65, which is fine. Below is my recipe for the homemade pizza sauce I like to make:
2x 500g cartons of tomato Passata - Tesco offer a carton for 69p each
2x teaspoons dried garlic or about 5 cloves of fresh
2x teaspoons dried oregano
1x teaspoon dried basil
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon sugar
1/4 teaspoon ground pepper
Splash of vinegar - apple cider is best, but you can use any vinegar you have. Lemon also works if you don't have vinegar.
This sauce cost me about £2 to make. Not only did it make 4 pizzas, it was also enough to use for a Bolognese sauce the next day, when mixed with another carton of Passata, so you could half the recipe if you don't need as much.
Method:
Chop or crush the garlic if you're using fresh, and then add all the ingredients to a saucepan and stir well. Pop the sauce over low heat for about 30 minutes, stirring to make sure the sauce is well mixed. Avoid adding a lid to the saucepan, as you want some of the water to evaporate so it thickens up the sauce.
Taste the sauce; if it's a little bland, add some extra salt or spices if you think it needs more flavour. The cooking normally enhances the flavour perfectly, but taste is a very individual thing.
Allow the sauce to cool. It doesn't need to be cold, just not boiling hot!
Your sauce is done, so now for the toppings.
I made four pizzas from my dough. I made five dough balls from my dough and froze two of them for another day, so I didn't need loads of cheese. I bought grated mozzarella from Tesco, own brand, and that was perfect for four pizzas. I could have used less, but I like cheese! Mozzarella is obviously an important of the pizza! Prices for this vary massively. I went to Tesco and they had 500g of Creamfields grated mozzarella for £2.99, which works out at £5.98kg. Their Tesco branded grated mozzarella was £2.65 for a 250g bag, working out at £10.60 a kilo, so quite a big a difference; needless to say, I went with the Creamfields version!
Pepperoni, how could I not have put pepperoni on the pizza right!? That worked out at £1.05 for a Tesco own brand, 110g pack, which was plenty for all 4 pizzas.
I could have then added extras onto the pizza if I wanted, onion perhaps, and veggies from the fridge, but I stuck with just the pepperoni, but pizzas are a great way to use up leftovers!
In total, I spent around £6.80 on ingredients. That made me four pizzas, so £1.70 each. It also left me with two extra dough balls in the freezer for another day, and half the sauce went towards the next day's dinner, so in reality, the cost was lower than £1.70 per pizza.
The pizzas were 12 inches, and as a thin pizza, they served 1 pizza per person; however, my partner only ate half, so that was her lunch for the next day.
How does that compare with supermarket pizza prices? Tesco offered a frozen Tesco pepperoni pizza, 350g, for £1.65, and a Hearty Food frozen pepperoni pizza (314g) for just 97p but, although cheaper, these are smaller and absolutely not as nice as homemade pizza! They also offered a fresh version, 272g, for £2.10 each, so twice the price as the cheapest frozen pizza and again not as nice as homemade, or as big!
In comparison, my local Domino's Pizza is offering two 13.5-inch pizzas for £41.48 including delivery, and that's with a £10 taken off as part of a deal. I could have used a gift card cashback app to save on the order, as I could also have done when I bought the ingredients to make my own pizza.
These are thicker pizzas than the versions I've made; mine are the stone-baked type, so they are not direct comparisons. To be fair, I've compared the price I paid to make four pizzas with the cost of one 13.5-inch pizza from Dominoes, which is £26.49, including delivery.
I suspect they've used less dough than I did and fewer ingredients for the sauce and toppings, so they will have spent less than I did, yet are charging over £20.00 more than I paid to make my 4 pizzas!
I don't, therefore, think it's unreasonable to suggest that making your own pizzas at home is a way to eat yummy food on a budget! There will always be variables to consider, such as the time and effort to make a pizza from scratch and having to buy the ingredients, so the need for planning in advance rather than ordering a pizza as a last-minute thought to feed a hungry family, but with a little planning you can save a fortune cooking from scratch!
One of my tips is to double the recipe and ingredients and make as many pizzas as you can from what you have (batch cooking). Cook them to a point where they're just cooked, but not completely cooked (cheese is melted but not gone completely brown yet), and then freeze them, and you'll then have homemade pizza in the freezer, ready for a short-notice meal! They only take about 10 minutes to defrost and heat through and are delicious!