too much crust on the outside

For me, pan pizza is all about the texture of the crust and the ratio of crust to toppings. To handle the extra thickness of the crust, it has to have more toppings too so that you don't have a bunch of dough with nothing to eat with it. I also like that because pan pizza is deeper, it doesn't need as wide of a crust to hold all those toppings in. Again, I don't need extra crust around the edge that is just plain dough. The texture of the crust should be just a little crunchy, from whatever oil/butter is used to coat the pan, and not too chewy...no bagel-like dough. Pan pizza I had from Pizzeria Uno many, many years ago is probably the one I've liked the best, but Pizza Hut does a mean job of it too.

The biggest downfall I've seen in pan pizzas are crusts that are so thin on the bottom that they get soggy or can't hold the toppings when you lift the piece of pizza. Another problem is a scarcity of toppings and cheese to balance out the thicker crust. Or so much tomato sauce that the other flavors are drowned out. I love tomatoes a lot, but I want to taste some cheese and other toppings too.

A good balance of crust and toppings

can't hold the toppings

If I'm going to eat pizza, I want to eat something that's good and gives my mouth a little crust, a little topping and a little cheese in every bite.

Pizza Time

It was Friday night and that always mean one special thing to me - no cooking. After a long week it's always nice to look forward to an evening with no homework, no regularly-scheduled activities and no meal to plan or prep. I like to cook for my family, but freeing up just one evening when we can do something else for dinner gives me a chance to spend more time with the kids or do something else that's fun.

This time we picked pizza which is always a win for the kids. We wanted to visit a local pumpkin patch so we decided to order pizza and pick it up on our way home. Since we were going to drive past Pizza Hut that was our natural choice, especially since they are the only ones I know that have a real "pan" pizza. Crispy, deep crust, lots of cheese. I'd never done an order online, but I loved Pizza Hut's online interface. It was simple but offered me everything I needed. I could even place the order for a future time which worked perfectly with our plans. I also felt confident that our order would be just as I needed it, with no communication problems that I sometimes face with phone orders.

I placed the order at 4:30 to be done at 6. At 6:05 my husband pulled into the parking lot of Pizza Hut to pick up the pizzas and we were soon home diving into the yumminess. When my son heard I had ordered him a sausage and pepperoni pan pizza he was ecstatic as evidenced by this picture.

Yes, I'm excited!

Others couldn't be swayed quite as much when they heard pizza was on the menu.

Once we dug in, it didn't take long to polish off most of 3 large pan pizzas. Hunting for the perfect pumpkin must work up quite an appetite. Now, I do love some pizza, but I recognize that even a veggie one isn't much of a balanced meal so I put together a salad for a few of us too. The others got apple slices. In the end, we could put the bits together to  make about one full pizza, slices that would definitely be on the lunch menu sometime this weekend.

Even the child who avoids crust, ate most of it. How can you not with that rich buttery goodness on it. One of the kids asked if this was "deep fried" pizza. Now, I didn't think it was that buttery, but maybe compared to others we've had recently it was. And maybe the number of napkins we went through and the evidence on the boxes shows just how buttery it was:

Top of the box

Seeing that evidence in the end was probably my least favorite part. No wonder it tastes so good! In all, we enjoyed it though and had a tasty meal out of it. I think if my kids ask for this exact pizza again it will be called the one we needed all the napkins for.

This is us

The four kids in one of their favorite moments

With the boy at the beach

Here we are. A happy family of 6...our 6th member is always taking the pictures, so is seldom in them. Plus, I wasn't sure he wanted to be on here. What do we like? Traveling, exploring the great outdoors, cooking, eating, playing games, reading, being a family, did I mention reading?

With the girls at the park