Pizza dough

When cooking the pizzas, preheat a large, heavy baking tray or baking stone in the oven and cook the pizzas directly on it. This will give you a fabulously crisp base. You may need to check that your baking tray can reach the temperatures required without getting damaged. And you’ll need to take extreme care removing and returning the tray (or stone) to the oven. Use oven gloves or thick oven cloths designed to withstand extremely high temperatures.

This recipe makes enough dough for six individual pizzas, just right for one person, but you can easily halve the ingredients and make either 2 large or 3 smaller pizzas. To cook all 6 at the same time, you’ll need several baking sheets on standby. Depending on your oven, the individual pizzas could be ready to serve in as little as 8 minutes, so it possible to bake in batches if people don’t mind waiting.

Fast-action yeast, is often sold in packs containing 7g sachets. You’ll find it in the baking aisle of the supermarket. It's also called easy bake yeast.

00 flour is a very finely milled Italian flour that absorbs water better than coarser flours. This helps you achieve a dough that's easy to stretch without tearing, but a high gluten content is also needed. 00 just refers to how finely milled it is and the gluten content can differ, so look for 00 flour that is labelled as suitable for bread, pizza or pasta (bread flours contain more gluten than plain or self-raising flours used for cakes).

To save hassle, you can warm the milk and water together in a saucepan over a low heat for 1–2 minutes. Don’t allow it to get too hot. The liquid should be just lukewarm, so it doesn’t prevent the yeast activating or toughen the dough; so watch carefully and stir often. If it does overheat, pour into a cold bowl and leave to cool for a while.

Passata (sieved tomatoes) makes a great topping for pizzas. You’ll find it with the tinned tomatoes and tomato purée, often sold in jars or cartons. Any leftover passata can be frozen in small, lidded containers for up to 3 months, or used for pasta sauces, stews or soups.

This is a great recipe to keep kids entertained when they have friends over. You can make the dough in advance, then give them the chance to roll it out and top with all their favourite toppings. Put ingredients such as grated cheese, mozzarella balls, sweetcorn, sliced peppers and ham in small bowls, so they can use what they fancy.

How to make ahead

Pizza tastes best when freshly baked, but you can roll out the dough and top the pizzas ahead of time. Put onto trays lightly dusted with flour and place in the fridge for up to 8 hours ahead of the time you want to bake them. Leave the pizzas to stand at room temperature for 30 minutes before baking on the trays they were prepped ahead on.

How to freeze

If you don’t need to make all the pizzas at once, you can freeze the dough after step 3. Divide into 6 balls and wrap each one in plastic film. Place in a large freezer bag, label, seal and freeze for up to 1 month. Take out as many as you need and thaw in the fridge overnight. Then remove the film and roll out. Alternatively, remove the film and put the dough ball(s) into lightly oiled bowls. Cover with a clean damp tea towel and defrost at room temperature for 1½–2 hours, or until the dough is soft and spongy. Roll out and use as above.