This friday, my brother and I treked out and took the long awaited journey to go purchase a fryolator. Well, he purchased it, I was just a co-pilot on the way there and picked out which one I wanted. On the ride home, we were brainstorming everything we could make. Well, rather, everything I could make for him while he sat and talked with me. Seeing as he has the diet of a 4 year old, we thought homemade pizza rolls would be good place to start. I've never made these before, nor have I ever heard of making homemade ones, so I kind of made it up as I went along. So, if any of you know someone who eats like theyre 5, or even if you just want a cool snack, different from what you usually have, I definitely suggest these. They work great as an appetizer, too!
First, you want to start by making your sauce. You can buy pre made pizza sauce if you'd like, but I opted to make my own. I only needed a little bit so I bought a can of crushed tomatoes and went from there. I cooked it in a small sauce pan, bringing it to a light boil, then reducing the heat to low and letting it simmer. I really seasoned it with garlic, oregano, parsley, etc. while it was cooking and eventually, we were good to go.
Next, I began to work on the dough. I had some dough left over from homemade pizza that I had made a few weeks ago and frozen, so I just defrosted that. After kneeding it on a floured surface, I formed it into a ball. If you want your pizza rolls to be less doughy and more sauce and cheese based, you can use wonton wrappers instead of dough...they can be prepared the exact same way.
I then cut small chunks from the ball, and thinned them out to about a half or a quarter of a centimeter thick, then cut them into squares. Its okay if the edges are a little bit thicker, because they will end up being cut off anyways.
After my sauce had cooled down a little big, I mixed together equal amounts of shredded mozarella and the sauce. Once it's all mixed up, scoop about 2 or 3 tablespoons of this cheese mixture into the middle of your dough square. Fold one corner over the opposite side's corner, and then repeat on the other side. and if you do it correctly, the pizza roll look somewhat like a teardrop shape. Trim off any unnecessary left over flaps of dough Poke a hole somewhere in the roll to avoid getting bubbles when you fry it.
Crack one egg and whisk it together. Then, brush this eggwash lightly onto all sides of the pizza roll. This will help prepare the roll for the next step.
Cover your pizza roll on all sides with bread crumbs. This is where the teardrop shape comes into play. You can now sit it up, larger side down, and cover the bottom, then just roll it across your plate and cover the entire roll. The eggwash from the previous step helps the bread crumbs adhere to the dough.
Fry the pizza roll in oil thats somewhere around 390 degrees until its golden brown on all sides. I chose to use canola oil, but you can use whatever your favorite cooking oil is... just a warning, not all oil is okay for frying. You need to make sure it doesn't have a low smoke point so that it doesnt cause a fire.
Pull it out of the fryer and it should look something like the picture above. Don't worry if a little bit of sauce or cheese ozzes out of the roll, its just further confirmation that the roll is cooked through.
Until next time,
K
NON-COOKS LIFELINE:
Light boil- as opposed to a rolling boil, a light boil is when the substance is just slightly bubbling, and the entire top is not covered in bubbles like when you think of boiling water. The bubbles are equal distances apart, but not rapid.
Simmer- when the food is just hot enough to create small bubbles, the heat point of food before boiling.
eggwash- when a egg is whisked toghether and then applied, usually by being brushed on or dipped, to a food. It is used to adhere things such as flour, batter, or any other type of coating.
Smoke point- a smoke point refers to the temperature at which oil cannot physically be heated any more without breaking down to glycerol and fatty free acids. Some oil starts to turn a bluish color at this point. The smoke released if you get an oil up to, or past its smoke point can be extremely harmful to your eyes and throat. You should always check an oils smoke point before frying with it. For instance, canola oil's smoke point is either 400 or 475, depending on whether the oil has been refined or not. However, since I knew that I would be staying around 350 to 390 degrees to fry these pizza rolls, canola oil was okay to use.
i do not eat like a little baby!
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