Pizza Party…. On a budget!

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Pizza Party…. On a budget!

Pizza Party... On a Budget!

Planning your child's birthday party shouldn't be stressful; it should be fun! It is a party after all... But let’s be real for a moment - As a busy mum of 2 myself I fully relate to the fact that party planning can in fact be very stressful!

To help us keep to a low budget and stay organised with make ahead party food prep, our to do lists and generally keep on top of our party prep I used my ‘Kids Party Food… Made Easy’ book! If you haven’t seen it, it’s linked here – definitely worth checking out if you’re in the thick of planning a kids party any time soon!

Anyway, we recently hosted a party at home for my daughter’s 7th Birthday – family only but that still meant we were hosting 10 adults and 6 children. As we’d decided we wanted to take her out to Legoland on the day of her actual birthday, her party was really just a little add-on; which meant we needed to keep it to a budget.

Trying to feed 16 on a tight budget though can be tough, until I realised the perfect solution that will keep both the kids and adults happy….. A PIZZA PARTY!

Personally, I’m not a huge fan of the cheap supermarket pizzas you can get, but also couldn’t justify the cost of going for more expensive options when you’re in the region of needing around 12 pizzas... which also meant takeaway was totally out of our price range too. So instead, I decided to make the pizza dough instead and was absolutely BLOWN AWAY with the cost saving; so much so I ended up triple checking my calculations myself!

By making the dough ourselves, we made enough dough for 12 pizzas for a TOTAL cost of £2.52… making each pizza base just 21p! Seriously, 21p!

Now of course, making it yourself does mean you need to add a little extra prep time leading up to the party and on the day, but I was happy to spend a little more time based on how much we were saving doing it ourselves. And the good news is, the dough is freezable so you can make it a couple of weeks in advance; which is exactly what we did.

Of course, once I realised how much we were saving on the pizza bases, next minute I was also making the pizza sauce too – making a huge quantity for less than half the amount it would have cost to go for a tinned option!

I’ll pop the recipes below and some instructions, but if you want to see the full extent of our party prep; check out the video here

Freezable Pizza Dough

Ingredients

1 x 7g Sachet Yeast

320ml Water (luke warm if proving at room temp, cold if proving overnight in the fridge)

1tbsp Granulated sugar

2 tbsp olive oil

1tsp salt

500g Strong white flour (or ideally 00 grade pizza flour)

Method

1. In a bowl, activate the yeast by mixing the yeast, water and sugar. Cover and set aside for 5 minutes.

2. Add the rest of the ingredients; oil, salt & flour and mix until a dough is formed. If you have a stand mixer, use the kneading attachment to knead the dough for 5-10 minutes, until the dough is elastic and you can successfully do the ‘windowpane test’* (see notes). Alternatively, lightly flour a surface and knead the dough by hand. If the dough looks a little dry, add another splash of water whilst kneading.

3. Once the dough is ready, lightly grease a bowl with a spray or brush of oil and pop the dough inside. Cover with clingfilm and allow the dough to prove at room temperature for 60-90 minutes. If you are making this dough 24 hours in advance and don’t want to freeze it, prove the dough in the fridge instead.

4. Once the dough has risen, remove from the bowl, knock out some of the air and split into 4. Either use or freeze at this point! To freeze, just place each ball into a labelled freezer bag and remove as much air from the bag as possible to avoid freezer burn.

Can you freeze the dough?
Yes! We froze this dough in individual balls after it had been allowed to prove for 60-90 minutes and had good results. We did test part-baking the bases for around 5 minutes before freezing; which worked and is an option if you wanted to - but it would have taken a lot of room up in the freezer compared to freezing the dough as balls.
How do you defrost the dough?
Remove the dough the night before and let it defrost in the fridge. An hour before you want to start rolling out your dough, remove it from the fridge and allow it to come to room temperature.
How far in advance can you make this dough?
I’d personally recommend making this a couple of weeks in advance and freezing the dough so it’s a little easier in the days leading up to the party. Alternatively, you can make it 24 hours in advance but put the dough in the fridge straight away before proving (not at room temperature).
Do you need to part-bake the bases?
You can simply roll out the dough and top with sauce & toppings before cooking. However, we had best results (especially as we were making a few pizzas at once!) when we rolled out the dough and part baked each base for around 4 minutes. These were then able to be stacked & wrapped until later on in the day.
What’s the ‘Windowpane test?’
When you think you’re done kneading, there is a simple test you can do to double check; otherwise known as the windowpane test and basically means that you should be able to stretch your dough to very very thin before it breaks. Just pull off a piece of dough, flatten it and then start to stretch it. If you can keep stretching until you can see through, the dough is elastic; which means it’s ready.

Pizza Sauce Recipe

Ingredients

1 tbsp olive oil

1 onion, diced

2 garlic cloves

2 x 400g chopped tomatoes

3tbsp tomato puree

1 tbsp dried oregano

1 tbsp dried basil

1 tbsp light brown sugar

Fresh basil, chopped

Salt & pepper, to taste

Method

1. Heat the oil in a large pan and fry the onions on a medium heat until softened. Add the garlic and fry for another minute.

2. Add the remaining ingredients to the pan, except the fresh basil. Bring to the boil and then reduce the heat to a simmer. Allow the sauce to simmer, uncovered, for 25- 30 minutes.

3. Add the fresh basil to the sauce and season. Blitz using a hand blender or processor.

4. Cool down the sauce within 90 minutes and either store in the fridge for 2-3 days or freeze.

Can this sauce be frozen?
Yes! Simply make it up, allow it to cool down (I show how I cooled it down within 15 minutes here) and then freeze in portions; ideally using a silicone food cube tray. If you don’t have a silicone food cube tray, you could portion in freezer bags and lay them flat in your freezer so they don’t take up much space!
Do you need to defrost?
Yes. Defrost as much sauce as you need overnight in the fridge the night before. Give it a quick stir and use from cold straight on top of your pizza bases!
Did making it yourself save money?
Yes! I doubled up the recipe below which gave me 1600g sauce and cost me £4 to make. When we buy a tin of pizza sauce, it usually costs us £2.25 for 400g – so the same amount would have cost us £9 to buy! For me, the cost saving was worth a little more effort prepping the food in advance.

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