25 Jun “No Drama” Pear, Walnut and Chocolate Pizza Recipe

As MasterChef contestants get ready to do the Battle of the Pizza, and the Sydney & Melbourne Pizza Festivals hot up, our clients are powering on with our Gourmet Power Pizza cooking team building event. Let’s face it – people love pizza, and when we toss in a high-energy, hands-on engaging team cooking event they love it even better.

What’s not to love about pizza? It has all those wonderful carbs we all love, topped with sensational sauce and toppings that are deliciously lick-smacking good. Even with the explosion in the variety of toppings that started back in the 80’s, my favourite is still the Margherita. It’s my test of a good pizzeria because there’s nothing to hide behind – you have to use great ingredients to highlight the clean, simple flavours of basil, buffalo mozzarella, tomato and fresh basil. A drizzle of extra virgin olive oil to finish brings the essence of pizza loving to your tastebuds!

You can imagine that being a Yank, I have tried just about every type of pizza from the New York City Slice to  Chicago Deep Dish. Being brought up in a big Italian family my Mama made about 25 pizzas every Friday night for my friends and family, and I did the deliveries to our rellies down the street. Her pizza was all about the semi-deep pan she cooked them in. Even sitting here writing this I can still taste every last morsel. It wasn’t until I travelled in Italy that I fell in love with the thin crust pizza first created in my ancestral city of Naples.

Our Gourmet Power Pizza team building cooking event has it all over the MasterChef Battle of the Pizza and the Pizza Festivals as you and your workmates cook pizzas together for delicious fun with lots of time to chat – so no dramas! Along with some zippy salads and accompaniments to lighten things up, your team cook about 6 different pizzas ranging from fresh vegetables, to prawn and asparagus, baby meatballs and mushrooms, and one of my favourites Pear, Walnut and Chocolate. Try our recipe below – it’s easy to make and absolutely a 10 out of10 on the “Taste Factor”. Who needs to vote for a MasterChef of Pizza when it’s you!

Method

1. Slice the pear thinly. Place into a bowl with 2 tbsp of the sugar and the lemon juice.
2. In another bowl, crush the walnuts with your hands. Mix in the maple syrup and the remaining sugar.
3. Spread half of the walnuts over each pizza base. Arrange half the pear slices onto each base.
4. Cook the pizza.
5. Remove the pizza from the oven. Sprinkle with half the chocolate buds and wait 1 minute until they have slightly melted before you cut.
6. After cutting, dollop a tsp of mascarpone on each slice. Enjoy!

Makes 2 pizzas