By Whitney Donohue

Moapa Valley Progress

School has started, and schedules have suddenly gotten more hectic. Now is the time for quick, easy meals, and have I got the recipe for you! Pizza. Homemade, but I promise that it really is easy, and you can actually put the kids to work (which is what I do).

Hopefully around this time of year, your garden is producing more zucchini than you know what to do with, but if that isn’t the case, zucchini is a cheap and easy staple to find at the grocery store.

Last year I purchased a book by Jim Lahey called My Bread. It’s a book that gives you the basics of no-knead bread. Lahey’s hypothesis is that bread has been around forever, so it couldn’t have been as hard to make as it is today.

One of the many things I learned as a professional baker is that bread that has a longer time to develop (in the refrigerator–it slows the rising) tastes better, and Lahey’s bread tastes awesome.

Lahey includes a no knead pizza dough recipe as well, and some great veggie versions (and some vegan as well) of different pizzas.

If I think about this in the afternoon, I will let the dough rise for about two hours on the stove. If I mix it up in the morning, it can sit in the fridge (covered) all day. Just take it out of the fridge 20-30 minutes before you want to start shaping it.

Zuchini Pizza

Jim Lahey’s No-Knead Pizza Dough

3 3/4 cups bread flour

2 1/2 tsp active yeast

3/4 tsp salt

3/4 tsp sugar

1 1/3 cups water

In a bowl stir together the dry ingredients. Add the water and mix until blended. This dough is stiff, not wet and sticky. Cover the bowl and let sit at room temperature for around 2 hours.

Oil two 11×13 jelly roll pans. Use half the dough for each pan. Gently pull and stretch the dough to fit the pan, using your hands to press it evenly out. Pinch any holes together.

The topping:

6 large zucchini

3 tsp salt

16 oz grated swiss cheese

Preheat the oven to 500°F. Grate the zucchini. In a medium bowl mix together the salt and the zucchini. Let stand for 15 or so minutes, until the zucchini has released its water.

Drain the zucchini in a colander, and squeeze the zucchini to get out as much water as you can.

Spread half the zucchini mixture over each pan of dough. Top with the shredded swiss cheese. Bake for 15 minutes or so, until the topping starts to turn golden brown and the crust is pulling away from the sides of the pan.