Tomato and Fresh Mozzarella Calzoni

A note about timing: The ciabatta dough must be mixed a day in advance of making the calzoni. It is a good idea to make the tomato sauce a day in advance, too, since it must cool before filling the calzoni with it.

You will also need for the ciabatta dough:

1. A large mixing bowl.
2. A standing mixer with a paddle attachment is optional and useful for mixing and kneading the dough since the dough is quite sitcky and elastic.

You will also need for the tomato sauce and baking the calzoni:

1. A medium-sized, heavy bottomed pot.
2. A pastry board and rolling pin, both lightly floured.
3. 6 rectangles of parchment paper, roughly 10″ x 8″ each.
4. 2 baking sheets or 1 baking sheet used twice.
5. Scissors or a knife for slashing the tops of the calzoni.

Making the ciabatta dough:

1. In a large mixing bowl, mix together the water, 2 cups of the flour and 1 teaspoon of the yeast. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and let the mixture rest overnight at room temperature.
2. The next day, pour the mixture into the bowl of the mixer and, at low speed, mix in the remaining 1 and 1/2 cups of flour, the remaining 1 teaspoon of yeast and the salt.
3. Clean out the large bowl that you used for resting the dough overnight. Oil and flour it lightly. Pour the (very fluid) dough into it, cover the bowl, and let the dough rise until it doubles, or, for about an hour or longer, depending on the room temperature.
4. Deflate the dough and let it rise and double again—for about another hour.

Making the tomato sauce for the filling and preparing the filling: The tomato sauce must be cooled before it is used to make the calzoni. Make it a day ahead and refrigerate it, or make it while the ciabatta dough rises (twice) and cool it in the refrigerator.

1. Heat 2 tablespoons of olive oil in the pot over medium heat. Add the garlic slices and chili pepper flakes and cook, stirring, until the garlic begins to color and turn golden.
2. Add the tomatoes. Roughly mash them up with a wooden spoon as they cook.
3. Add the sugar and cook the tomatoes down over medium heat for about 20 minutes, or until they thicken into a sauce. Snip up the basil and add it to the sauce and mix it in. Remove the pot from the heat and cool the mixture before assembling the calzoni.
4. Just before putting the calzoni together, cut the fresh mozarella cheese into slices and then cut the slices into little cubes.

Assembling and baking the calzoni: There are step-by-step illustrations on the related link.

1. Preheat the oven to 400 F.
2. Divide the dough into 6 balls.
3. Roll out a ball into a circle, roughly 8 or 9 inches in diameter.
4. Put a rectangle of parchment on the pastry board and place the dough circle on it before adding the filling. (Each calzone will be transferred to the baking sheet by lifting it up on the sheet of parchment and placing it, still on the parchment, onto the baking sheet. The dough is soft and elastic; using parchment underneath the calzoni to transfer them to the sheet for baking reduces wear and tear on the unbaked pastries.)
5. Place about 3 tablespoons of sauce on the half of the circle nearest you, leaving about a 3/4-inch border.
6. Spread between 2 and 3 tablespoons of mozarella cubes on top of the sauce. (Estimate the amount of cheese to use in each calzone so that you have about the same amount in all six of them.)
7. Sprinkle a little oregano over the cheese.
8. Fold the unfilled half of the circle up over the filling. The calzone is now in the shape of a half moon.
9. To seal it: Twist the ends and make a rolled border by rolling the bottom edge up and over the top one, in toward the filling, pressing the two edges together as you roll them. (There are illustrations of how the calzone will look at this point on the related link.)
10. Cut some slashes in the top of the calzone with a knife or with scissors.
11. Transfer the calzone to the baking sheet by lifting up the edges of two sides of the parchment rectangle and shifting the calzone, along with the parchment, onto the baking sheet.
12. Continue making calzoni in this way until all the dough, sauce and cheese is used in 6 calzoni.
13. Let the calzoni rest for 10 minutes, then bake 1 sheet of calzoni at a time for about 20 minutes, or until they are golden. As the calzoni bake, some of the juice and cheese will dribble out through the slashes, but they will not burn on the parchment and the goodness of the finished calzoni won’t suffer in any way.
14. When done remove the baking sheet from the oven and let the calzoni sit on the baking sheets for 5 minutes to firm the filling a little before transferring them to cooling racks.

A Note: Calzoni are good hot or cold and the freeze well individually wrapped.

An acknowledgement: This version of ciabatta dough is based on one by King Arthur Flour. Of the many I have tried, this one has been the all-round most successful.