Ciabatta Bread Pizza

A twist on the classic French Bread Pizza. I'm always looking for something easy and cheap to feel all the young mouths here, and every once in a while I come IP with something that not only is simple and good for the kids, but really satisfies my wife and my adult taste buds.

Last Saturday was a good day for me regarding this. I happened to be at my local Stop and Shop and they had a loaf of Ciabatta bread there under their Artisan Bread section. I had my doubts that the bread would live up to its branding, but it looked good and felt soft, and at only $4 I thought I'd give it a try. But what would I do with it?

Saturday afternoon rolls around and the kids start asking for lunch. I think, let me give Ciabatta Pizza a shot, see how it comes out. But the next problem is the sauce. A while ago I bought a case of Hunts sauce cans which turned out to taste pretty bad. Luckily I was recently at a friends house who makes his own sauce and I just picked up a few ideas that might just help this stuff out. After putting some olive oil in the bottom of a saucepan, I added to finely sliced garlic cloves and let them simmer until they started turning crispy and brown. I then poured in the can of sauce and let it come to a simmer. Finally, I added a bit of basil and gave it another minute on the stove. Sure enough, the sauce wasn't half bad, and dare I even say, it was good.

Now this is where the magic happens. After slicing the Ciabatta bread in half, I through it in the over to get the top layer a little toasted to help keep the bread from getting soggy later on.

Finally, on top of the toasted bread, add a decent amount of the sauce you made and top with a healthy amount of mozzarella cheese. Put it in the over until the cheese starts to melt, then use the broiler to get the cheese nice and spotty brown. When I used the toaster over, the cheese melts nicely and then proceeds to get spotty all in one shot.

The last, and probably best step is slice, serve, and enjoy.