How to make perfect thin-crust pizza at home

I love to eat pizza that has a thin, crispy crust, but I haven’t been able to find a good way to make it at home. What am I doing wrong?

There is a lot to love about homemade pizza: It’s golden, hot and bubbly, and fun to customize. A few simple tricks will help you make the crust crisp and perfect every time. Start with the right kind of flour.

Unbleached all-purpose flour works fine, but to add crackle, combine it with high-protein flour. The higher protein content (11 percent or more) produces extra gluten, which adds a crackerlike texture to cooked dough. Look for flour made from durum, a hard wheat; it is sometimes called semolina or pasta flour.

When baking, use a pizza stone (available in kitchen-supply stores), and preheat it well. By evenly distributing intense heat throughout the dough, a stone makes the pizza base firm and crunchy. Heat it on the lowest rack of a very hot oven – about 500 degrees – for about an hour before you carefully slide the pizza dough on top. Cook for four minutes. Then, before adding the toppings, spray the dough lightly with water to make it extra-crispy.

Precooking toppings keeps them from making the crust soggy. Saute your ingredients until most liquid is cooked away, and drain them before placing on your pizza. If you’re using canned tomatoes, drain them, crush them and drain them again before using. If you prefer a cooked sauce, make it thick. Avoid adding too many toppings, which will weigh down the crust.

If you are not serving the pizza immediately, don’t wrap it in foil to keep it warm. Instead, leave it uncovered, and reheat it for a few minutes when you’re ready to eat.

I would like to have a yard sale. Do you have any advice on how to organize one?

A yard sale is a wonderful way to eliminate clutter and to “recycle” the belongings you no longer need. The key to organizing one successfully is planning well in advance.

First decide on a weekend for your sale. It’s a good idea to invite neighbors and friends to participate, since multiple-family yard sales attract more customers. Even if you don’t include your neighbors, be sure to alert them, so the extra traffic won’t come as a surprise. You’ll want to check with your town hall, as well, in case you need special permission for additional parking, for commercial use of residential property or for temporary signs.

Once your date is set, place an advertisement in the classified section of a local paper. Give the date and time, a rain date, the exact address and directions, and mention the intriguing items for sale. If you don’t want people showing up at your door at the crack of dawn, specify “no early birds.”

You should prepare for the sale by making easy-to-read signs and posting them in your neighborhood. Make a large sign for your yard, too. Next, gather as many picnic, garden and card tables as you can. Assemble everything you want to sell on the ground, then plan table displays. Lure shoppers with eye-catching arrangements of items – group objects in the same color, for example. Make items as accessible as possible, putting clothes on racks, books in boxes and miscellaneous items on tables.

Set your prices high enough to allow for bargaining, but not so high that you’ll scare off buyers. And let people know that you’re willing to negotiate. If you have any question about the value of prospective yard-sale items, have them appraised ahead of time. You can also consult antiques price guides or online sales and auctions to learn the going rate for specific collectibles and furniture.

Have help on hand the day of the sale: Assign someone to greet shoppers as they arrive, and another person as the cash attendant, so all the money is in one place. Clearly mark one table as the cash table, to centralize buying, receipt giving and bagging. Have plenty of singles and quarters and bags saved from the grocery store, and keep an extension cord handy so buyers can test electrical equipment.

By midmorning of your sale, much will be gone, so regroup and reprice your tables. Move items closer to the street for impulse buyers passing by, and reduce prices during the last two hours of the sale. By afternoon, consolidate: Pack unneeded goods, and begin bagging litter. Keep cardboard boxes nearby for packing what doesn’t sell, and donate these items to a local charity.

Questions should be addressed to Ask Martha, care of Letters Department, Martha Stewart Living, 11 W. 42nd St., New York, NY 10036. E-mail to mslletters@marthastewart.com.

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