A Bigger View Article: Preparing the Perfect Pizza Pie

Grab your cooking gear and get ready to make the perfect homemade pizza pie! Sissy's guests, Kevin Spooner and Douglas Coffin of The Big Green Truck Pizza, give us the dish on how they've perfected their pizza on the go.

Pizza has become one of the most popular American foods. To meet the demand, Doug and Kevin decided to create a whole new way of delivering pizza. Their truck is fully equipped with a wood-fired pizza oven. They drive the truck to homes and businesses and prepare delicious pizza, which they can then serve, literally, hot from the oven.

Doug and Kevin share some secrets for preparing a delicious pizza in your own kitchen. The first step in creating your pizza is making a tasty crust. You will need four basic ingredients:

3 cups of flour
½ ounce to an ounce of yeast
1-1/2 tsps of salt
1 cup of water

Kevin suggests that you use high-protein flour because it has more gluten in it. Gluten is the stuff that traps the bubbles of carbon dioxide and makes the dough rise.

Add all of the ingredients except the flour together in a mixing bowl. Begin mixing and slowly add the flour until all of it is completely incorporated. Voila! You've got your dough. Once the flour is completely mixed in, you will want to knead it for approximately five minutes as well. You will want to let your dough proof; which means allowing it to sit for a day or so before using it.

For the sauce, Kevin suggests using crushed, raw tomatoes because they will be the easiest to spread. If you don't have time to crush up your own fresh tomatoes, it's fine to use canned. You can even get creative starting with the sauce. Kevin and Sissy added oregano and garlic to their sauce, but this is your pizza, so feel free to add whatever spices tickle your taste buds.

When spreading your sauce, pay attention to the thickness of your crust. If you've prepared your dough for a thinner the pizza, stay light on the sauce. If it's a thicker pizza, you can add a little extra sauce if you'd like.

For your cheese, you'll want to use whole milk mozzarella made from buffalo's milk. It will give your pie more flavor and you can mix it with other cheeses such as pecorino romano like Kevin does. Add any other toppings you love - pepperoni, peppers, ham, pineapple, olives - again, whatever your taste buds desire.

The last step before we can enjoy our pie is cooking it. Follow the guidelines of the specific recipe that you are using but keep this tip in mind regarding your crust: The size and thickness of your pie will determine how long and at what temperature you will want to cook your pizza. For a thinner pie you will want to keep the oven at a higher temperature for a shorter time. With a thicker and larger pizza you will want to cook it longer but at a lower temperature. Also, check out MSN Shopping to purchase a pizza stone so that your pizza really tastes like it came from The Big Green Truck Pizza.

We understand that you may not have a souped up truck with a wood-fired oven like Kevin and Doug to bake your pizza, so for more specifics on cooking your pizza as well as lots of other great pizza recipes and ideas, please visit our Food & Entertaining section on MSN.com.

Perfecto! You have one final task - enjoy Your Big Life and your pizza pie! A big thank you to Douglas Coffin and Kevin Spooner from The Big Green Truck Pizza for sharing their experience and pizza dough recipe with A Big Life. For more information on The Big Green Truck Pizza, visit their website: http://www.biggreentruckpizza.com/.

For more tips from Kevin and Doug, check out Sissy's tips.

Have an original recipe of your own you want to share? Or maybe you have a cooking story you just can't wait to tell us. Let us hear what you have to say or email us at abiglife@nbcuni.com.

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