Calzones are my favorite to make, because you can tuck almost any combo of leftovers in them and have a portable meal to go.  We especially like ham and cheddar; turkey, broccoli and swiss; pizza combos; and bbq.  They are great for grabbing to eat at the soccer fields or for a picnic meal.  My kids even like to pack leftover calzones for cold lunches. The whole thing can be done from the homemade dough, to the meal in hand in around 45 minutes, and most of that is wait time.

Here’s the basic dough recipe.  I double it when we have a crowd to make 16 calzones.  They are pretty big, so women and children usually just want half.

Calzone Dough

1 2/3 cup warm water

1 Tbs yeast

2 Tbs honey

1 Tbs olive oil

1 tsp salt

4 cups flour (I usually use fresh ground hard white wheat.  All-purpose flour works too.)

Combine the water and yeast in a bowl and let rest a few minutes until the yeast is moist all over and softened.  Beat in honey, oil, and 2 cups of flour.  Let rest for 15 minutes. (Resting the dough like this with only half the flour, relaxes and aligns the protein strands without kneading to make a soft, easy to handle dough.) Beat in salt and remaining flour.  lightly oil the surface of the dough and let rest at least 5 minutes before rolling.

Divide dough into 8 balls.  Roll into a circle and top half of the circle with your favorite toppings.  Pull the uncovered half over the top and pinch to seal.

Bake at 375 degrees for 20 minutes.  Brush warm tops with melted butter or olive oil and sprinkle with a little garlic salt or parmesan blend.

If you don’t want that many calzones the dough makes great breadsticks also.  You can see I made few after I realized 1 calzone was going to feed 2 kids.

I’m having a super busy day today, but I’ll try to make a video soon to show you how I use my Danish dough whisk to make these by hand and how to crimp the edges.  

Someone asked on Tuesday how I made these ahead for the 14 kids we had over Monday on President’s Day.  I didn’t make them ahead.  We have a fairly large kitchen and a good portion of the kids stayed in there with me while I cooked.  They played games at our round folding table that seats 10.  I pulled up a stool and beat the dough with my whisk while I talked with them.  Then walked over to the folding table island to roll and fill them.  A couple of the kids thought it looked like fun so popped over to help.  I put out orange wedges, veggies and dip, and chips for snacking while we waited for them to bake which kept the crowd under control as homemade bread smells filled the house.