Hi all!

My wife and I love the idea of making pizza. We have been trying to
save money and our thought is for the price of one mediocre pizza from
a pizza place, we can make 10 of our own. I'm from New York but we
live in a midwestern town that only has chain pizza places. My wife
is hooked on New York style pizza too because of our many trips to
visit my family in New York.

We are having a problem getting the crust just right. I used to have
a pizza stone but we have been trying to make it in a pizza pan
because I have never been able to work with a pizza peel effectivly.
Is it reasonable to think that we will be able to make a pretty good
crust in a pan or do I have to keep practicing with the stone? I'm
not looking to immitate the pizza crust you get at a Brooklyn
restaurant, I just want it to be brown and support the toppings pretty
well. We have tried two different kinds of pizza pans, one with holes
and one without. With both types, the top browns nicely and the outer
crust ring looks and tastes great but the bottom, while cooked, is
white as snow and not chewy/crispy enough.

Just to add a little background, I make the dough using a kitchenaid
mixer with a dough hook. The recipe is a simple yeast, flour, olive
oil, salt mixture listed as "crusty pizza dough" in the mixer cookbook
but I have seen similar recipes online. Except for the
browning/crispness problem, the dough tastes great and is easy to put
together.

We use store bought pizza sauce and mozzerella cheese mixed with some
oregano and other italian seasonings (have been experimenting). The
cheese/oregano mixture tastes pretty good and is much closer to what I
remember from New York than the chain pizza places. If anybody has
any advice on toppings though, I would appreciate that too.

Ok pizza makers, please help us! After making a few of our own we are
astounded that we used to pay $15 to $20 for what adds up to about
$1.50 worth of ingredients and even though we haven't perfected the
recipe, it still disapperars in a hurry!

Rich