Pizza - express.....

Picture the scene.  23 children, hands newly-washed; four tables; four lots of ingredients; four assorted sets of utensils and measuring tools; four printed recipes.  And an hour until lunch.

We were going to be making pizza.  Fast pizza.  From scratch.

Dough first.  In a cloud of flour (ground, as we know, from wheat seeds) we worked our way through the recipe, each taking responsibility for one of the steps.

1. First the water went into the bowl:

   

2.  Next the yeast was stirred in:

3.  A sprinkling of salt:

4. The fly-away flour:

5.  The fun part - we all got to 'knead' the sticky dough:

 

6.  A slick of slippery oil (squeezed, as we know, from the fruit of an olive tree):

7.  And then it got (oh my goodness; look at the time!) a mere waft of warm air to help it rise, while we set about the toppings:

Paper plates all round.  A selection of knives (some rather sharp - ouch!)  And range of things to be chopped.  Or, in some cases, utterly pulverised.

Pineapple:

Peppers:

and Mushrooms (not strictly speaking a plant):

Share out the dough (I guess it will rise in the oven!)

Squish it to shape (who didn't wash their hands quite thoroughly enough?)

 

Harrison even demonstrated a nifty bit of professional-looking pizza-base tossing.....

with a few impressive catches for good measure!

Now, choose your toppings.  A smear of tomato puree (made, as we know, from the fruit of the plant)?

 

A sprinkling of oregano (the dried and chopped leaves of a plant)?

You decide.....

 

And (by the skin of our teeth) ready to bake within five minutes of lunchtime!  Not bad, eh?

With heartfelt thanks to Tommy's mom Kathy, without whom, none of this would have been possible!