Arugula and Prosciutto Pizza

a thin bubbly crust pizza topped with fresh arugula and prosciutto sits on a wooden pizza peel

This summery pizza is topped with a garlic and rosemary olive oil sauce, lots of shredded mozzarella, hand torn slices of prosciutto, and a bed of peppery arugula tossed with a bit of lemon juice.

Tip: Make your pizza dough in advance so it's ready to go when you are.

Prep Time 10

Cook Time 6

Total Time 16

Servings 12-16" pizza

Ingredients

1 portion overnight thin crust pizza dough (approx 8 oz or 200-250 grams)
½ tablespoon semolina flour (for sliding the pizza off the peel)
1 tablespoon all purpose flour (for stretching the pizza dough)

Olive Oil Pizza Sauce

¼ cup olive oil
¼ cup shallot (minced)
1 clove garlic (minced or grated)
1 sprig fresh rosemary (minced)
⅛ teaspoon diamond crystal kosher salt
⅛ teaspoon black pepper

Pizza Toppings

¾ cup low-moisture mozzarella (grated)
1 tablespoon parmesan cheese (finely grated)
3 slices prosciutto
1½ cups baby arugula
1½ tablespoons lemon juice (about half a lemon)
½ teaspoon diamond crystal kosher salt (use half as much of any other brand)
¼ teaspoon freshly cracked black pepper

Instructions

An hour before you're ready to make your pizza, arrange the baking steel in your oven (on top rack if you have a broiler in the top of your oven) and preheat the oven at 500°F for at least an hour. Remove pizza dough from the refrigerator at least 60-90 minutes prior to stretching.
When you're ready to assemble your pizza, make the olive oil white pizza sauce by combining minced garlic, shallot, and rosemary with olive oil. Grate the mozzarella on the large holes of a box grater and set aside.
Hand stretch your pizza dough. Plop the dough down on a generously floured clean countertop, and dust the surface of the dough with even more flour. Gently press the dough flat in the center to define a thicker outer crust. With both hands, pick the dough up from the top crust edge and hold it with your fingertips and thumbs pointing down. The dough will begin to stretch down toward the counter. Rotate the dough through your fingertips, letting the dough stretch downward as you go. Gravity will do most of the work, so be gentle and patient so you don't tear the dough.
When the dough is about 7-8" across, lay it flat on your counter and slide your hands under it with your palms against the counter. Stretch the dough on the backs of your hands by lifting them and and gently stretching them apart, rotating the dough between each stretch.
When the dough is thin in the center with a thicker crust and about 12-14" across, dust the pizza peel with semolina flour and place the dough on the peel.
Assemble the pizza. Spoon the olive oil mixture over the dough and use the back of the spoon to spread it out. Top it with the grated mozzarella and parmesan cheese, then arrange the prosciutto across the pizza, tearing it into pieces with your hands. Let it drape and tent over itself so that lots of edges and corners are pointing up toward the broiler.
Shimmy and launch. Shake the pizza back and forth on the peel to make sure it hasn't stuck, then launch the pizza into the oven on the baking steel. Set a timer for 2 minutes. Rotate the pizza and cook for 2 more minutes. If it still looks pale, give it 1 more minute.
Arugula topping. While the pizza is cooking, toss the arugula with the lemon juice, salt, and pepper.
Broil. Broil the pizza for the final 30-60 seconds. If your oven has a broiler in the top, just turn the broiler on. If your oven has a broiler in the bottom drawer, slide an upside down sheet pan into it to support the pizza, then slide the pizza onto the sheet pan to broil.
When the pizza is done, remove it from the oven. Top it with the arugula mixture, cut it into slices and serve immediately.

RECIPE NOTES

If you aren't serving this immediately, wait to dress the arugula and arrange it on top until right before serving.
If you don't have a baking steel, follow the baking times and temperatures from whatever pizza dough recipe you used instead of following my baking instructions.
If your oven has a broiler in the top of it, you'll want to preheat your baking steel on the top rack of the oven and turn on the broiler in the final minute of baking.
If your oven has a bottom drawer broiler, place an upside down sheet pan on the rack in there. When the pizza finishes on the baking steel in the oven, slide it onto the sheet pan in the broiler drawer for about a minute to get it nice and brown on top.

Variations: