Saturday, March 27, 2010

Calzones!

I would love to have pictures to go with this recipes, but the flash died on our camera recently, and I just don't have enough natural light in my kitchen to get good food pictures. Maybe someday, I'll add pictures in, but for now, we'll go basic. Ready?

I love this Persian Bread recipe for pizza and calzone dough, so that's where I started. If you have a favorite pizza dough, feel free to use that instead, of course.

For filling for one recipe of dough, mix together the following:
2 cups mozzarella
2 cups cottage cheese or ricotta
1 t basil
1 t oregano
1 egg
1/2 - 1 c parmesan

I added one pound of browned and cooled sausage to the above and mixed it all together. You could also add meat separately as desired, if you want a variety of calzone flavors. Or, if you're not into meat, just throw in some more cheese until the consistency seems right. With the pound of sausage, this made about 5 cups.

Tonight, I actually made two recipes of dough and doubled the filling/meat. That feeds our family with a bit leftover, but I realize our family isn't "average" size, so I'm giving the single batch recipe. Anyway, I played with the assembling of the calzones a bit, and you can go one of two ways with it.

Preheat oven to 450'

For personal calzones, divide one recipe of dough into 10-12 balls of dough. Roll out each ball into a circle about the spread of your hand across (this is 8" for me, but it's easier to use my hand than a ruler, and if your hand is a bit bigger or smaller, I'm sure it'll work just fine).

Place an appropriate amount of filling on each calzone. I wound up with five cups of filling for 11 balls (one batch of dough with a single recipe of filling), so I used a bit under half a cup for each calzone. Spread the filling on one half, leaving empty space around the edge for sealing.

Use your finger to put some water on the edge of the half of the circle that you're going to fold over the topping. Fold over, making a half-circle, and seal the edges by pinching them together.

Bake personal calzones for ~10 minutes at 450'. The crust should be golden brown.

For larger calzones that you will cut into serving size, divide the dough into four larger balls, split the filling four ways, and seal as described above.

Bake larger calzones for 12-14 minutes at 450'.

Marinara sauce on the side is a nice, but not essential, option.

Enjoy! I'd love to hear what you think if you try it.

2 comments:

Merri said...

I made them tonight, Laurel. They were wonderful!! The whole family loves them, and we are a hard group to please. Thanks so much for the recipe. It's a keeper. Do you think that the dough or the mixture you put inside is freezable? It would be great to pull it all of the freezer and just assemble and bake for a quick dinner.

Laurel said...

I haven't tried it, but I'm guessing they would freeze wonderfully. Maybe bake them halfway first? And I would freeze them separately on a cookie sheet before putting them in a container together. Let me know how it works.
Thrilled that you all enjoyed them! :-)