If you are one of those crazy people who is for some reason wary of cold pizza, then this might not be the recipe for you.  This pizza is different than most out there in that the finished product is a pizza that is meant to be eaten cold.  The dough is cooked completely plain and then cooled.  Once cooled you top the pizza with cream cheese that has been zhuzhed up with chive and lemon, along with smoked salmon and red onion.  This is a great recipe for the summer when you are craving pizza, but perhaps do not want something as heavy as a traditional hot pizza.  This works great for an elevated lunch or serve alongside a salad for an easy dinner.    

The recipe starts with mixing together the pizza dough.  After all, if you are going to have a good pizza you need to have a good foundation.  Pizza dough, like bread, is a yeasted dough.  Therefore, many of the same principles that apply to bread making apply to pizza making. 

For my traditional pizza dough, I like to use bread flour since it has a higher protein and gluten content.  This helps to create a stronger, crispier crust that hold up well when weighted down with a lot of toppings (and what is the point of having pizza if you aren’t going to load it down with a lot of toppings).  Also, in the interest of keeping the crust strong and crisp I avoid enriching it with any type of fat (such as olive oil or butter).  Therefore, it is a pretty simple mixture of bread flour, sugar, salt, and instant yeast. Like with bread dough I avoid letting the salt and yeast come into direct contact, so that the salt does not inhibit the yeast. I also add a small amount of sugar to help activate the yeast.

For pizza dough I tend to prefer instant yeast.  For me, pizza should be a relatively quick and convenient item to make.  Using instant yeast, which only requires one full rise, helps accomplish that.  Also, unlike a traditional bread recipe where I am looking for a longer proving time so that more flavor and structure can develop, here I am making a dough that is already going to be laden with flavorful toppings.  Making the longer proving time a little less necessary. Like with most yeasted doughs you are looking for it to double in size when it proves.

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Speaking of flavorful topping let’s talk about that.  Smoked salmon is already full of rich smoky salty flavor and tastes great on its own or paired simply with cream cheese.  However, you’ll find that some lemon zest and juice, as well as, fresh chives and sour cream, mixed into the cream cheese really serve to enhance the flavor of the smoked salmon.  An important item to keep in mind here is letting the cream cheese soften before you work with it.  It will be much easier to mix in the other ingredients if the cream cheese is close to room temperature.  This helps create an even spread of flavors across the pizza. 

As I mentioned earlier the pizza dough is cooked ahead of time, cooled completely and then topped. Weather permitting I prefer to cook my pizza dough on a stone on the grill, however, cooking on a pizza stone in the oven works just as well. The pizza dough will rise significantly while baking since it has no toppings to weigh it down. Therefore, I usually flip it over about halfway through the cooking process to help prevent any large air bubbles from forming. Once fully cooked and nicely browned, remove from the grill or oven and allow to cool completely before topping.

Once cooled you can then spread the crust with the prepared cream cheese mixture. Now, here is where I get a little preachy when it comes to pizza: Unless the crust is stuffed with cheese I don’t want to see it. I spread my toppings all the way to edge completely covering the pizza. Anything else is, in my opinion, a waste. Once evenly spread from edge to edge with cream cheese you can then cover evenly with the smoked salmon.

To finish the pizza, I top with some thinly sliced red onion and freshly cracked black pepper.  There is no need to add any salt since the smoked salmon already has a high salt content. I suppose you could also add capers, but if you do, don’t tell me about it.

Now all that’s left is to slice it up and enjoy!

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