I know we all made no-knead bread for a while there, and I saw the no-knead pizza dough recipe in Bon Appetit last month.  But it wasn’t until today that the recipe began to really intrigue me.  Because today, the “Genius Recipes” feature that I love on Food 52 proclaimed that “not-kneading pizza is even simpler than not-kneading bread.”  What the…?

If anyone has made both the no-knead bread and the no-knead pizza dough, can you please explain to us how not kneading one is easier than not kneading the other?  Thank you.  And, hey, if you’ve made the pizza dough, how was it?

I did not, obviously, make the no-knead pizza dough.  I made my same old pizza dough, with a bit of whole wheat flour, and topped it with crispy broccoli, creamy feta, garlic and spice, and the zest of a lemon.  And about that crispy broccoli?  It’s not like fresh-crispy.  It’s like roasted-to-a-crisp-crispy.  Roasted Broccoli Pizza with Feta: Chop two heads of broccoli into medium-small florets, and peel and chop the stems into slightly smaller pieces.  Use your hands to rub the broccoli with olive oil and salt.  Roast at 450 for 15 minutes, then add several chopped cloves of garlic and return to the oven, stirring occasionally, for 20-30 more minutes, until florets are crispy.  I roasted the broccoli for 30 minutes total then turned off the oven and left the broccoli in while I got my daughter from school.  Perfect.  Cooking is flexible like that.  At least half an hour before you want to bake your pizza, heat your oven as hot as it goes (mine says 550 but gets nice and hot if I preheat it for a while), and put in your pizza stone if you have one.  Roll out a homemade (recipe here) or store-bought pizza crust, rub with a little olive oil, then top with a thin layer of mozzarella cheese.  Spread the broccoli over it (plus all those crispy bits of garlic), then crumble on a generous amount of creamy feta cheese.  Sprinkle with red pepper flakes, a bit more mozzarella and a little freshly grated Parmesan cheese, and bake.  My very thin crust was crispy in four minutes, but your pizza might take longer depending on the thickness of your crust and the heat of your oven.  Zest a lemon over the hot pizza and give it a few good grinds of salt and pepper.  Serve with a green salad (this lemony romaine salad is great with pizza).