St. Catherine of Alexandria Pizza Wheel

For St. Catherine of Alexandria's feast today we made a pizza wheel.  St. Catherine was an early Christian martyr.  She was set to be tortured on a spiked wheel but at her touch it miraculously broke apart. She was then martyred by beheading.  The wheel is one of the symbols associated with her. This is a variation of a traditional pizza with the center cut and "wheel spokes" folded over to form a wheel shape dough. It could be made with a sweet filling as well and served as dessert or breakfast. In this recipe, we went with a traditional pizza. The red of the sauce recalls her martyrdom as well. This recipe will make a large size pizza or two smaller crusts . We made a luncheon size today with half the recipe.

Dough ingredients:
2 1/4 t. yeast
1 1/2 t. salt
3 t. honey
1 1/4 c. warm water
3 T. olive oil
3 1/2 c. flour

Directions:
Combine yeast, salt, honey and water in bowl. Add the flour and oil and mix with dough hook. Add flour until dough comes together in a solid ball.  Grease a bowl with oil, add the dough, cover and let rise in warm area until doubled (about 1 hour).

Spread dough on parchment paper. Cut center into eight sections like picture - leaving approximatley 3 inches around outside uncut. Spread sauce, cheese and toppings as desired around uncut part of ring.

Fold over each "spoke" and attach to outer edge by pinching dough together.

Transfer to baking sheet or stone. Cook at 400 degrees for 12-18 minutes.