Cast-Iron Favorite Pizza

February 2032. The welding classes began and they were immediately different from the pipeline training in ways I was glad about. The vocational students were younger—mostly seventeen to twenty-two—and were coming to welding as a possible career, which meant they were genuinely open rather than needing to unlearn bad habits. They were also Cherokee Nation students, which meant the context of the work was the same context as the food curriculum: this was their community, this was the skill set that would let them build and repair things for the people around them.

I taught the first session the way I always teach the first session: with the basic safety, then with the demonstration, then with the student's hands on the equipment within the first hour. You can't teach welding by talking about it. The students who were nervous relaxed when they saw that I wasn't asking them to be perfect, just to try and pay attention to what happened.

One student—a young man named Ely—asked me after the first session why I'd made the center bead slower than the rest of the demonstration. I said: because the center bead is doing the most structural work and you give more care to the things that carry more weight. He thought about this and said: is that true outside welding too? I said: yes. He said: okay. Then he asked if he could practice on a piece of scrap before next class. I said: obviously. He was there the next morning when I unlocked the room.

That evening after Ely asked if he could come in early to practice, I went home and made pizza in my cast-iron skillet—the same pan I’ve cooked in for fifteen years, seasoned by every fire I’ve ever stood in front of. There’s something about cast iron that makes sense after a day in the shop: it holds heat the way good welds hold structure, evenly and without complaint, and you have to give it the same slow attention in the center that I was telling the students to give their beads. I made it the long way that night, not because I was hungry in any urgent sense, but because I wanted to do something with my hands that asked me to pay attention to what mattered most.

Prep Time: 20 min | Cook Time: 25 min | Total Time: 45 min | Servings: 4

Ingredients

1 lb pizza dough, store-bought or homemade, at room temperature
2 tablespoons olive oil, divided
1/2 cup pizza sauce or crushed tomatoes
1 1/2 cups shredded whole-milk mozzarella cheese
1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes (optional)
1/4 teaspoon garlic powder
Toppings of choice: sliced pepperoni, mushrooms, bell pepper, olives, or fresh basil
Kosher salt, to taste

Instructions

Preheat the oven. Set your oven to 450°F (230°C) with a rack in the lower third. Let it come fully to temperature before baking.
Prep the pan. Coat a 10- or 12-inch cast-iron skillet with 1 tablespoon of the olive oil, spreading it evenly across the bottom and up the sides. This is the step most people rush—don’t. An evenly oiled pan gives you an evenly crisped crust.
Press the dough. Place the room-temperature dough in the center of the skillet and press it outward with your fingertips, working slowly from the middle toward the edges, until it fills the pan. If it springs back, let it rest 5 minutes and try again.
Par-cook the crust. Place the skillet over medium heat on the stovetop for 3 to 4 minutes, until the bottom of the dough just begins to set and pull away slightly from the sides. This builds structure before the oven does its work.
Add the sauce. Spoon the pizza sauce over the dough, leaving a 1/2-inch border at the edge. Spread it in slow, even circles outward from the center—the center carries the most structural load of every bite, so be generous there.
Top the pizza. Scatter the mozzarella evenly over the sauce. Add your toppings, then sprinkle with oregano, garlic powder, red pepper flakes, and a pinch of kosher salt. Drizzle the remaining tablespoon of olive oil over the top.
Bake. Transfer the skillet to the oven and bake for 18 to 22 minutes, until the cheese is bubbling and golden and the crust is deep brown on the bottom when you lift an edge with a spatula.
Rest and slice. Remove from the oven and let the pizza rest in the pan for 5 minutes before slicing. This lets the cheese set so your slices hold together cleanly. Slide onto a cutting board and cut into wedges.

Nutrition (per serving)

Cast-Iron Favorite Pizza — When You Give More Care to the Things That Carry More Weight