Sunny Sausage Pizza

by Christa Upton
(South Dakota)

Recipe 35 in the Solar Hot Pot

Sunny Sausage Pizza

Actually one of these pizzas is going to be a mostly veggie pizza (because I don’t like sausage), but sausage sounded nice in the name. LOL

I am doubling this batch of dough to make two pizzas in two Solar Hot Pots. Even if you don’t have two Hot Pots, you can make a double batch of dough or more and put the rest of the dough in the freezer to use the next time.

Prep pizza dough by mixing in large bowl (glass or ceramic is preferable for the yeast):

1/2 t. yeast
3/8 c. warm water (about bathwater temp., not over 115 degrees)
drizzle of honey or 1 T sugar

Wait until yeast bubbles. Then add:

3/4 t. salt
1 1/2 t. olive oil
1/2 c. unbleached white flour
1/2 c. whole wheat flour (not pastry)

Stir until dough comes together. Then knead with dough hook in electric stand mixer for 15 minutes or by hand 30 minutes (or just knead until you’re tired and don’t worry about it. LOL Unless you are picky about your pizza crust texture, it will still be good.)

For increased flavor, you can fridge dough for 18-24 hours. Either way, grease bowl and turn dough to “grease” dough. Cover loosely with plastic wrap (tighter if it’s going in the fridge). Let dough rest 15-30 minutes before using.

Then prep by chopping toppings you want on your pizza. Some people like these “raw” on their pizza; I like mine “sautéed” a bit, so I’m putting these into the bottom of one Hot Pot to cook while the crust pre-bakes. The easiest way is to leave them in there the whole crust-baking time, so for once, you can (and maybe WANT) to chop them bigger so they don’t get cooked to death:

green and/or banana pepper (chop)
onion (chop)
mushrooms (slice)

1:45 pm—1 T butter or oil: put in Solar Hot Pot, set up facing the sun, set timer for 15 minutes.

In my OTHER Hot Pot, I will be cooking the sausage underneath the crust (pre-baking the other crust). You could put both the sausage and the veggies in one Pot, or just cook the sausage and leave the veggies raw, or whatever.

For a sausage-only Pot, preheat the pot empty (don’t need the butter).

If you want homemade sausage, mix:

1 lb. ground pork (raw) (or any ground meat)
1 1/2 t. sage
3/4 t. black pepper (or more)
1/4 t. cayenne (or more)
1 t. salt

I HATE touching raw meat, so I either put it in a zip top bag and squeeze the bag to mix or get someone else to to do it. LOL

Rub butter on a round baking rack (one that fits in your Hot Pot of course). (I wonder if a small metal pan would work, too. I don’t have one small enough to fit in the top of the Hot Pot; feel free to comment below if you find one and it works!)

Stretch your dough to fit baking rack, brush bottom of dough with oil or butter so that hopefully it will not stick to the baking rack. Set dough on baking rack.

2:00 pm—veggies and/or sausage: add to Hot Pot(s), stir/break up the sausage if you can. Pizza dough on baking rack: set in top of Hot Pot(s). Set timer for 90 minutes.

Again, if you don’t like your pizza veggies cooked to death, you could take them out after 30 or 60 minutes. I am going to leave them in, especially because the dough in the top of the Pot will slow down the veggies cooking in the bottom.

(If you are doing this at high noon, mid-summer, good sun, etc., you might want to keep an eye on the dough so it doesn’t get TOO done. Probably don’t want it to brown too much at this point.)

3:30 pm—take veggies and/or sausage out. Tongs might help get that baking rack off the top. Quickly wipe out the bottom of the Pot (don’t want residue to cook), and top pizza:

Tomato sauce: spread a little on pizza.

Cheese: sprinkle on.

“Sautéed” toppings/sausage, and any other toppings you might like (fresh tomato, fresh basil, olives, fully-cooked meats, pineapple): put on pizza.

Cover, adjust to sun, set timer for one hour.

4:30 pm—make sure cheese has melted, put pizza on plate or cutting board, cut, and eat!

So we pre-baked the dough only 60 minutes, and the crust was a bit under done. Therefore I changed the recipe for you to be 90 minutes on the crust before topping. But that’s what I’m here for—to try my recipes and make sure they work. LOL

Other than being under-done, the crust texture was very nice. Amazing to cook pizza in the sun! You would think I would be “over” the amazingness of cooking in the sun by now, but I still just love to see it working.