Ten years ago, we lived in Sydney and our local pizzeria served a really tasty tex mex pizza called Cisco (the restaurant is Beaches-still going and still serving Cisco). It seemed gimmicky but we gave it a try. It was delicious and didn’t leave us with the usual dough/cheese leaden feeling in our stomaches that pizza can sometimes leave (we could also try eating less pizza in one sitting, but I digress). That first taste led us to try to make our own pizza from scratch for the first time. Probably because we thought it’d be very unlikely we’d run across this kind of pizza again.

The dough: First, we got hold of my mother’s pizza dough recipe (originally sourced from her friend from our Regina days). It was a great starter recipe but after much tinkering we weren’t quite convinced we had it right. So we consulted the mighty  Jamie Oliver and realised we were missing semolina flour. We’ve adjusted that recipe too, and 300g semolina to 700g white flour works for us….and only try 100% whole wheat flour if you like the feeling of having a brick in your stomach later on. 50% spelt flour is a nice variant, though.

Enormous amounts of kneading will reward you with beautiful fluffy dough (with quite a bit of flour added until it’s no longer sticky). I can’t claim any credit in this area-I will happily spend hours chopping ingredients, stirring and adjusting flavours, but I can’t be bothered to spend more than a couple of minutes kneading before I get bored. Luckily J seems to enjoy it, so I focus on the sauce…

The sauce: thank you once again, Jamie Oliver; this sauce is so simple and delicious. I’m generous with the olive oil and let it simmer for around two hours at least to get the thickness we like. It freezes well too, so big batches are worth it.

The topping: here’s where it gets even easier. Buy a can of kidney beans in chilli sauce, drain about 80% of the liquid and spread evenly across the stretched dough. Grate a fine layer of hard cheese (goat’s cheese for me) to add a little bite. Put it in a well heated oven at 220F for about 30 mins, or until the base is cooked. Remove from oven and slice up.

The garnish(es): first, make up a batch of guacamole – 1 avocado mashed, and dashes of lemon juice (fresh or from concentrate), ground coriander and fresh black pepper until the balance of flavour is to your liking.

Drop a spoonful of guacamole on each slice, followed by a heaped teaspoon of yogurt, followed by a few half slices of cherry or mini plum tomatoes.

Eat a slice. Then eat some more.