My friend Brandi came to town for a week and for the occasion i decided to make tomato pie knowing it was her favourite and that i wouldn’t have to modify any of my recipes to accommodate the non-vegan.

If you don’t know what a tomato pie is it’s pretty much a thick square pizza with tomato sauce on it and is even better when eaten cold! It’s the kind you eat when you watch the Phillies try to make it to the series again or finding out that NHL Center Ice has a free preview during the month of October and you can watch the Habs on the west coast!

Since my experiments with pizza dough have not been successful thus far i was wondering how to go about making this pie knowing it would have to be thicker then regular pizza dough. So i decided to do a french bread tomato pie. 

Vegan French Bread

in a large bowl mix

one pack of dry active yeast + 1 tbs sugar + 1/4 c. warm water & let sit for 15 minutes, just enough for the yeast to activate. 

add  2 1/2 tsp salt + 1 1/4 cup of water and slowly incorporate the flour 1 cup at a time (up to four cups, i usually do 3 1/2ish)

mix well . if it’s too sticky add a bit of flour, but make sure to incorporate everything perfectly.

form into a big (dough) ball

in a large bowl add 1 tbs of olive oil & roll the oil around the bowl so all the edges are nicely greasy & drop your ball in the oil (yeaaah). make sure to turn the ball a few times so that all sides are well oiled. take a clean hand towel and rinse it under hot water, strain water out of the towel so it remains damp but not dripping & sit the hot towel on top of the bowl covering your oily dough ball.

let stand for 2 hours

after the 2 hours take the towel off the edges of the bowl your dough ball should have risen over double its original size. kneed the dough nicely and shape it into whatever you’d like your bread to look like. This particular time you’ll want to shape it IN the large rectangular baking pan you’ll be using for the pie. Oil the pan well and place the dough in, stretch it to fit the pan and raise the edges a bit. I sprinkled onion salt from edges to center and vegan dry parmesan cheese. Cover the pan with aluminum foil and let rise while you make the sauce.

Tomato Sauce

In a sauce pan

Sauté 3 cloves of garlic in olive oil until a bit roasted

Add 1 large can of roma tomatoes (i put the tomatoes in the blender prior to dumping it in the sauce pan) + 2 tbsp of tomato paste + 1tsp or oregano + 1/2 tsp thyme. 

Stir well and let cook for 15 minutes on medium/low

Take off the aluminum foil off of the dough pan and add the sauce from middle to edges (don’t be shy to apply a thick layer). 

Oven @ 400F

Bake the pie on middle rack for about 23 to 25 minutes, until edges are golden. Let cool for a few minutes and served. 

Put left overs in the fridge and enjoy it even more when cold.