I don’t know about you, but around here, we love pizza, especially Neapolitan style thin-crust pizzas. And we have definitely gotten into making our own pies here at home. We’ve slowly collected all the gear to use on Pizza Night; the pizza stone for baking, pizza paddles for transferring it to the oven, and quite a few of the pizza specialty flours from King Arthur Flour. We love experimenting with different toppings as well as crusts. So finding myself with a bit of left over corned beef and taking some inspiration from an Irish Pizza I saw over at Lexi Bites blog, we decided to make our own version of an Irish Pizza. This Hibernian gem has a thin Guinness infused pizza crust which is topped with shredded corned beef, leeks, crispy potatoes, thyme and Irish Cheddar. Rather than a red sauce, I used leftover Horseradish Cream Sauce which I usually serve with my annual St. Patrick’s Day Corned Beef feast. What a tasty pie!
I will take this opportunity to give you a wee bit of advice on the making of a thin crust pizza though. The absolute most difficult thing we’ve encountered in all our pizza making endeavors is simply not overloading the crust. Man is that hard! I mean, you’ve got all these delicious toppings just sitting there right? If a little is good, more has to be better…Not true! Tons of toppings will quickly weigh down a thing crust pizza, making it nearly impossible to transfer from the pizza paddle onto the stone and will often make the crust soggy. So you must exercise restraint here! And if you really don’t think you’d be into making your own pizza dough, I get it. You can run out and get a store-bought crust and proceed with the Irish-y toppings. It’s a great way to use up some leftovers. Pour a few pints and get busy…bet you’ll have some fun and have a tasty meal to boot!
Irish Pizza with Corned Beef, Leeks, Crispy Potatoes & Irish Cheddar
Recipes adapted from: King Arthur Flour (for the Guinness Pizza Crust), & Lexi Bites (pizza topping inspiration)
Ingredients:
For the Ultra-Thin Guinness Pizza Crust:
- 3 Cups (372 grams) King Arthur Flour Perfect Pizza Blend flour ( or can substitute in 1 1/2 cup all-purpose flour, 1 cup semolina flour & 1/2 cup durum flour)
- 1 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon instant yeast
- 2 Tablespoons olive oil
- 1 – 1 1/4 cups warm (98° – 110° F, 37°C) Guinness Stout (you can substitute water in place of the Guinness if you wish, though I’m not sure why you would…)
For the Pizza Toppings:
- 1 – 1 1/2 cups leftover corned beef, shredded or cut into smaller pieces
- 4 leeks, thinly sliced and sautéed in butter until softened
- 1/3 cup Horseradish Cream Sauce (recipe to follow) if you don’t like horseradish, substitute plain sour cream
- 1 cup hash browns, cooked until crispy
- 3/4 cup mozzarella cheese, shredded
- 3/4 cup Irish Cheddar, shredded
- 1 Tablespoon fresh thyme, leaves only, chopped
- 1 Tablespoon fresh chives, chopped
Directions:
Combine the dry ingredients, oil, and 1 cup of Guinness, mixing and kneading everything together by hand, mixer or bread machine set on the dough cycle until you’ve made a soft, smooth dough. The dough should be soft and supple; adjust with additional Guinness or flour if needed. If you’re kneading in a stand mixer, it should take 4 to 5 minutes at second speed, and the dough should barely clean the sides of the bowl, perhaps sticking a bit at the bottom.
Place the dough in a dough rising bucket, or large bowl, lightly covered with plastic wrap, and let it rise at room temperature for 60 to 90 minutes, or until it begins to look puffy. In the meantime, preheat the oven to 425°F. If you are using a baking stone to bake the pizza on, place it into the oven at this time.
While the dough is rising, prepare all of your toppings; chop the leftover corned beef, sauté the leeks and set them aside to cool, cook the hash browns until crispy and set aside to cool, grate the cheese, chop the thyme and chives, mix up the Horseradish Cream Sauce. (recipe noted below).
Once the dough has risen, divide it into two equal portions and place each on a lightly oiled 12″ pizza pan, or on parchment paper lightly spritzed with cooking spray.
Use your fingers to press the dough outward from the center to make a very thin, flat circle about 12″ across.
Spread the toppings over the dough, keeping in mind not to overload the thin crust. Hold the chives aside to sprinkle over the pizzas once they are out of the oven
Bake for 12 – 15 minutes, or until crust is golden brown and cheese is hot and bubbly.
Top with chives and serve immediately.
Enjoy!
Horseradish Cream Sauce
This recipe will make far more sauce than you need for your pizza’s. However, it is delicious to have on hand to eat with any leftover corned beef and/or potatoes. It is also great on the Colcannon Skillet Cakes.
Recipe adapted from: Bon Appetit
Yield: 1 1/2 cups
Ingredients:
- 1 cup sour cream
- 6 tablespoons prepared white horseradish (about 4 ounces)
- 1 tablespoon chopped fresh chives or green onion tops
Directions:
Whisk all ingredients in small bowl to blend. Cover and refrigerate at least 2 hours. DO AHEAD: Can be made 2 days ahead. Keep refrigerated.
Irish Pizza brought to you by: Runcible Eats (www.leaandjay.com)
Helpful Links to Kitchen Tools & Ingredients for Irish Pizza:
Thermoworks Super-Fast Thermapen Cooking Thermometer
Emile Henry Flame Top Pizza Stone
King Arthur Flour Perfect Pizza Blend Flour
Lea & Jay 