Sometimes a person needs a shortcut. For me, that meant buying some frozen bread dough from Save on Foods to help me along in a weekday calzone attempt (something I feel slightly guilty about after reading that Chris makes from-scratch bread every week). We had used that particular brand before for our dessert pizza experiment last year, but having not defrosted it correctly meant that the dough was difficult to roll out into the appropriate shape. This time, I was convinced that I could defrost the dough properly.
On that weekday, I made sure to hit “defrost” on the microwave, and watched the dough carefully. At about the seven minute mark, I stopped the machine, but it was already too late – the dough had already started to cook, resulting in a hard crust in places. Mack did his best to roll it out without a rolling pin (that would have been handy), but we ended up creating two individual, thick-crusted pizzas that night.
Over the weekend, in order to make use of the leftover toppings we had purchased, I tried to defrost it the conventional way by taking out the frozen dough in the morning. Of course, had I read the instructions more carefully, I would have known that the dough was meant to be defrosted in the fridge, instead of at room temperature. As a result, after I let the dough rise in a warm oven (where it exploded into a shape three times the size of what we started with), a thin crust had formed on the dough.
This time, however, emboldened with a rolling pin (hurrah for Winners, my favourite housewares store), Mack was able to roll out a eight or nine-inch sized crust, so we figured it was large enough for a two-serving calzone. We spread tomato sauce over half of the dough, and topped it with mozzarella, pepperoni, and fridge-gleaned red pepper and tomatoes. We folded over the dough, sealed it with some water, and pressed down on the edges to further enclose the pocket. I brushed the top with a bit of vegetable oil, and put it into a 375 degree oven (I used a Real Simple recipe as a guide). After about twenty minutes, our calzone was ready, nice and golden brown on the outside.
Pepperoni, Tomato and Red Pepper Calzone
I was afraid that there would be a bit too much dough, but as it had been rolled fairly thin, it was all right. Having been helped along by pre-made dough, it was a straightforward recipe that was perfect for two. I would make it again, although I would hope that the third time would be the charm with actually defrosting the dough correctly.
Occupations: 
Occupation: My day job is communications/media and government relations for Alberta’s dairy producers. My nights are spent on freelance writing and communications contracts. Up until a year ago, I was the editor of 
Occupation: Insurance Adjuster 
Occupation: Land Developer
Only Here for the Food 