Italian Flatbread

I don’t like pizza.  I know. I know…  I think that I dislike the sauce most places use.  It is too sweet and acidic.  I also dislike the gooey under cooked pizza crust.  And the cheap ingredients.  So, I make flatbreads.  You can use any flatbread to make this, naan, focaccia, pita, French bread, or anything.  I think using fresh dough is best.

Serves: 4-6

Hardware:  Measuring spoons and cups, a cutting board and knives, a skillet, a slotted spoon, a bowl, a microwave safe bowl, a pastry brush, a wooden spoon, a rolling pin, and a pizza stone or baking sheet, pizza cutter
Time: Resting time: an hour and 10 minutes, Prep time: 10 minutes, Baking time: 25-35 minutes

Ingredients:

• 1-16 ounce raw, fresh pizza dough (can be found in the bakery section of most markets)
• ⅛ – ¼ cup flour
• ¼ pound Italian sausage
• 1 teaspoon olive oil
• 2 tablespoons butter
• 3 garlic cloves
• 5 or 6 fresh basil leaves
• 1 fire roasted yellow or red bell pepper
• 3 slices of a large onion
• 4 ounces prosciutto
• 2 plum tomatoes
• 4 ounces fresh mozzarella cheese
•  ½ - 1 teaspoon red pepper flakes
• 2 tablespoons + 2 tablespoon parmesan cheese
•  (cooking spray if you are using a baking sheet)

1. Pre-heat the oven to 400°.
2. Allow the pizza dough to rest in the bag, at room temperature, for an hour.
3. While the dough is resting, slice the garlic, pepper, onion, prosciutto, tomatoes, and mozzarella.  Stack the basil leaves and roll them up.  Slice them into very thin shreds. Set aside.
4. Heat the olive oil on medium high.  Remove the sausage from the casing, brown, and crumble.  This should take about 7 minutes.  Using the slotted spoon, remove the cooked sausage and place it in the bowl.  Sauté the onion in the same pan for 3-4 minutes or until it is soft and translucent. Set aside.
5. Punch the dough down.  Roll it out on a lightly floured surface into a 14 inch diameter circle.  It should be very thin.  The dough is very elastic and will shrink back.  Keep stretching and rolling.
6. Place the dough onto the pizza stone or the baking pan.  If you are using a baking pan, spray it with cooking spray first.
7. Put the butter and the garlic into the microwave safe bowl and zap at 50% for 1 minute.
8. Pour the butter and garlic into the center of the dough.  Using the pastry brush spread it out over the entire flatbread.
9. Dot the flat bread with the mozzarella.  Sprinkle the onions, pepper, and basil evenly over the flatbread.
10. Next evenly cover the flatbread with the prosciutto and sausage. Next layer the flatbread with slices of tomatoes.
11. Finally, sprinkle the red pepper flakes and 2 tablespoons of the parmesan cheese evenly over the whole flatbread.
12. Bake for 25-30 minutes or until the dough is golden brown.  As soon as you remove the flatbread from the oven, sprinkle it with the remaining parmesan cheese.   Allow the flatbread to rest for 5-7 minutes before cutting.