If there’s one thing for certain in life, it’s that Fridays are made for pizza.
We LOVE pizza in this house and I just don’t ever see that changing. Ordering out is always an easy way to get a yummy dinner, nice and fast. But sometimes, when we’ve still got the energy after a long week, we make our own pizza. (As I’m sure many people do).
When I was in university, I kind of lived off of pizza pockets. There was this one delicious pizza place, conveniently located on the walk home from the on-campus bar, that had the most amazing pizza pockets. Or, that’s how I remember them. Perhaps I was a bit ‘foggy brained’ when ordering them.
They were so good, in fact, that my roommate and I once attempted to flirt with the teenager serving us to get some free dipping sauce. (Oh, our early 20s. Is there a more cringe-worthy time in our lives?)
Anyway, since I’ve never found an equally amazing pizza place that serves up delicious panzerottis as that one in my old university town, I decided we should attempt our own.
This is so easy and the results are awesome.
Ingredients:
Whole wheat pizza dough – We bought ours at our local grocery store, but I’m sure you could find it at a bakery, or you could make your own
Pizza sauce, shredded mozzarella and whatever else you love to put on your pizza – We put green olives, peppers and some pepperoni for my meat-loving husband
Instructions:
Preheat oven to 450 F. And wait until it’s fully pre-heated before baking your pizza pockets
Lightly dust your counter space/work space with flour and place the dough on it. Cut it into 6 to get 6 small balls of dough to work with.
Cover a rolling pin with flour and roll each ball of dough out into somewhat of a circle, about 7-8″ wide. You just have to be able to fold it over into a half moon when done dressing it up.
Start with the sauce (obviously) and cover the entire circle of dough (but be sure to leave some space around the entire edge of the dough for the crust). Place your cheese also on the entire circle of the dough – also leaving space around the edge.
Add whatever toppings you desire on one half of the dough.
Bring the dough over the toppings, folding it in half. Then fold both the bottom and the top edges upward and pinch together around the entire pocket. You can use a fork to press along the folded and pinched edge to ensure it will stay closed.
Lightly oil a cookie sheet with olive oil, and use a little bit on top and on the edges of the pizza pocket as well. This will help it go crispy and golden brown.
Bake for 15 minutes – until golden brown. When they come out, they’re HOT for quite a while. So let them stand for a bit before cutting them – and then give them extra time to cool off before serving to kids.
Enjoy!
