Kids in the Kitchen – Make Your Own Pizza Night

I love cooking with kids. Each summer I spend working at a sleep-away camp teaching girls how to cook. The girls look forward to coming to the cooking activity to create something they made themselves, which gives them a great sense of accomplishment. I encourage them to find their inner chef and use their own creativity. We have made everything from sushi, hot pretzels, brownies, even doughnuts.

Everyone’s favorite activity is making pizza. The dough recipe I use is very basic.  After the dough has risen, the girls then can use a variety of toppings to put on top of their pizza. We use mushrooms, onions, feta cheese, peppers, different spices, tomatoes, olives, even pineapple (very popular in Australia, from where I hail).

During the year when I am home with my own children we have “make your own pizza night”, more fun and cheaper than plain old pizza night.

We start with a basic water, sugar and yeast mixture.  At home I use my kitchen aid because I generally double my recipe and it mixes better when doubled or tripled.

We then add the flour and salt and let the machine mix it together using the dough hook.

Within 2 minutes I have terrific pizza dough, we let it sit for 30 minutes while we get the toppings ready.  (This batch was made with a mix of white and whole wheat flours).

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I keep it easy with jarred Marinara from Gefen, my favorite.

My kids throw on a variety of different toppings on top of the sauce, we slide it into a hot oven and 10-15 minutes later, wallah, a hot delicious pizza filled with veggies my kids can’t wait to eat.

What do you like to top your pizza with?

Here’s my Pizza Dough Recipe

Browse below for topping ideas and choose your favorites.