Okay I may as well admit straight up that I haven’t actually hosted a DIY pizza party.

I may know my way around a Eurovision party with a sequined blindfold but a proper pizza party requires the proper pizza kit and I am not sure a wood-fired oven would fit on my balcony, even if I moved my flamingo.

It’s lucky that my second cousins have a bona fide wood-fired pizza oven and live just one suburb away. My cousins are part Italian and part Greek so everything that comes out of their kitchen is a perfect love child of Mediterranean flavours and technique. Naturally I jumped at the opportunity to be part of a family DIY pizza party hosted by these near-professionals.

I arrived to find the kitchen table topped with perfect pillows of dough positioned in neat lines. The home team had been busy proofing dough for days and worked up three different bases, including a sourdough base which went on to be the favourite of the day.

Each pizza base was slathered in a mixture of pureed tinned tomatoes, fresh basil and a touch of olive oil.

The DIY element meant that everyone brought their own selection of toppings and they covered almost every inch of the table.

We’re talking freshly shaved prosciutto, ham, ricotta cheese, mozzarella cheese, parmesan cheese, salami, olives, marinated peppers, marinated artichokes, roasted pumpkin, caramelised red onions, mushrooms, char-grilled eggplant, fresh basil, rocket, anchovies and roasted beetroot. Read More