Pizza is one of those great *universal* foods that everyone knows and loves. Once confined to Italy and Italian neighbourhoods today pizza is known, loved and eaten worldwide. It seems like no matter where you travel you’ll always find a pizza shop or café, restaurant etc that has pizza on its menu.

Pizza is the ultimate comfort food.

With a little time, practice and patience you can make your own pizzas at home, from preparing the dough yourself to buying pre-made pizza bases – here are the reasons WHY you should make your own pizzas.

• Making Pizza is so easy! It doesn’t matter how big or how small your kitchen is, with the basic tools you find in most kitchens you can make pizza dough. All pizza dough follows the same basic steps and has the same basic ingredients – flour, yeast, water and salt. Some pizza doughs swap white flour for wholemeal flour or add a touch of oil. There are so many pizza dough recipes out there, with some practice and time you’ll find the one that satisfies your needs the best and one that cooks to perfection every time.

• Making your own pizza means you are making a healthy pizza –  when you make your own pizza you have control over each and every ingredient that is used. Always use the freshest ingredients you can find. The old favourites still work well – cheese, tomato sauce, onion, capsicum, ham, pepperoni etc, but there are also lots of new favourites that can be used today. Vegetables are popular – try fresh tomato, garlic, mushrooms, onion, eggplant or zucchini. Seafood including prawns works well on pizzas – EXPERIMENT! The only limit to your pizza creations is your own imagination – have fun!

• You will be saving yourself money – you would be surprised how little it costs to put together your own pizza creation. The cost of putting a pizza together at home is cheaper than ordering out. If you like your pizza a lot, why not buy ingredients in bulk – you’ll save more money this way and you can always freeze your pizza to be cooked later. Alternatively, some of your pizza ingredients can be frozen for next time which will save you money.

• Making your own pizzas is a LOT of fun! It can be fun getting together with friends – or family and spending time putting your creations together. You can either give people set tasks or make it a challenge for teams to make the most creative and delicious pizza they can. Kids especially will love getting involved, they get to help out, make dinner and you might even be able to convince them to help clean up afterwards.

• You can make your pizza just the way you like it. If you want a gluten-free dough, a wholemeal, or even a multi-grain dough it’s no problem when you are making your own. Also, if you or a family member or friend has any food allergies you can make a pizza that’s perfect for your needs. Making a pizza at home is easier than trying to find the right options in store bought pizzas.

• You get to be your own *quality control*. When you make your own pizza, you can control what is used on your pizza- and how much. Whether you love onions, or bacon, or loads of cheese, you can make a pizza that suits your very own tastes. Once you get the right equipment and get some recipes *under your belt*, you’ll soon be making pizzas that are healthier than store bought.

• People love pizza. Yes, it really is that simple! Invite friends around for a meal, they may be a little *concerned* about what you might be preparing, pizza is one of those dishes that pleases everyone, a not-so-spicy, light on the veggies pizza for the kids, a pizza topped in meat for a mate, or something a little more lo-cal for the girls, whatever you make will be a crowd pleaser.

• Pizza is a great way to eat *seasonally*. While you probably don’t think of pizza as a seasonal dish – it’s that flash heat from cooking a pizza in a pizza oven that really brings out the flavours of the toppings you are using.  Pizza is a great base for fresh produce and it really helps bring out those flavours to get your taste buds tingling.

Get a Wood fired pizza oven and some pizza making recipe today! Then make your own pizza at home. Your hand-made pizza will make you healthy and happy.