Stairway To Heaven -- Best Pizza Ever...

So for those of you that have followed us for awhile, you know that we spent several years in WA and have grown to call it home. Well, among the many things that we love about it out there, our favorite pizza joint is there in the PNW! For whatever reason, I've really been in the mood for it over the last day or two. So I finally decided to make my own version of it today. Why I haven't made it before now is beyond me. It's crazy simple, but when we're in the mood for pizza, we typically end up just getting takeout. This is so simple, though. I might have to start making it on a constant basis. It was definitely an easy way to get Samuel to eat his greens!

So, after having a few friends ask for the recipe, I decided I'll just quickly type it up on the blog...

Since I think the pizza dough recipe that we used is just alright, I won't bother telling you what that is. We're still on the hunt for the perfect recipe, but I didn't take the time to worry about that today. I had made a large batch of dough a few weeks ago from a recipe I found online, then froze portions of it, so that's what I used. Between making such a thin crust and having so much flavor from the toppings, you couldn't notice the mediocre dough so it all worked out.

So, it's fairly simple. This is all you need...

A couple Roma tomatoes

Basil

Extra virgin olive oil

Garlic

Fresh mozzarella

Shredded Parmesan

Arugula

Prosciutto (not pictured -- I totally forgot to buy that while I was out!)

Parchment paper

Pizza stone

There's no real need to get specific with measurements, as you can use as little or as much as you want. As you can see from the Costco-sized minced garlic container, we like our garlic in this house!

So after you decide what type of dough you want to use, you can begin to pretend you work at a pizza shop. James used to work at one in college, so he's always adamant about tossing the dough in the air to stretch it out. I'm clearly not a pro at that, ha.

While you're preparing the dough, you'll want to put the pizza stone in the oven and preheat the oven at 500 degrees for 30 minutes. You'll then put the dough on a piece of parchment paper and spray it with olive oil -- covering the whole thing. You can sprinkle minced garlic and basil across the pizza as well at this point. I pretty much cover ours, but that's personal preference...

Then add the fresh moz. Again, I load it up. Who doesn't love cheese?!

Once the oven is preheated, put the pizza (while still on the parchment paper) on the stone. It only takes 8-10 minutes, so keep an eye on the pizza. Just looking at the cheese bubbling up makes me want more. Yum!

While the pizza is cooking, go ahead and dice up your tomatoes...

Then once it's done, top the pizza with arugula, tomatoes, Parmesan cheese and then drizzle some more EVOO on top. And there you have it...Stairway to Heaven...

The great thing about using parchment paper is that the cheese that melted off the side comes right off!

The only thing different than the original from our favorite pizza shop is that I added basil and left out prosciutto. I hate that I forgot to add that to the grocery list, but I didn't feel like running back out when I realized it was missing. It definitely adds more flavor, but it's still great without it!

Samuel LOVED it!

Now to find that perfect pizza dough recipe...

If you have one that you love, please share!

And for those of you in the Pacific Northwest, go check out The Rock. It's our fav!

***Edited***

We made this pizza again last night, but used this recipe for the dough. It turned out MUCH better, but I think we're going to tweak it a little bit on our own to make it more how we like it. I would definitely recommend it as it is, though!