Spicy pepperoni Sicilian pizza (no-knead pan pizza)

Mix 250 g bread flour, 5 g salt and 2 g instant yeast with your fingers; add 165 g room-temperature water (about 65% hydration, the minimum for no-knead) and 20 g olive oil. Mix until no dry flour remains.

Cover and leave at room temperature 8 to 16 hours. Optionally give the wet dough a few turns overnight with wet or oiled hands to improve its structure.

Turn half the dough out onto a lightly floured wooden board, keep moving so it does not stick, and shape a tight ball by tucking and twisting; finish on an unfloured board to tighten the skin.

Put olive oil in a nonstick pan, add the dough, more oil on top, squash it down a little; cover with plastic wrap and proof until slack (a couple of hours at room temperature).

Or proof on the oven's proof mode at around 80 or 90 degrees for a faster, controlled proof; it took about an hour and a half.

For the sauce, heat a couple of tablespoons of olive oil on medium, add 9 finely minced garlic cloves, oregano and Piment d'Espelette or red pepper flakes and a pinch of salt; cook until the garlic softens and smells good but does not brown.

Add a can of whole peeled tomatoes and crush them in the pan with a pastry cutter, leaving some chunks.

Bring to a simmer, taste and add salt; reduce a little to concentrate while keeping a bright tomato flavour.

Stretch the proofed dough past the edges of the pan a few times so it pulls back into the corners and fills the pan.

Lay sliced provolone directly on the dough, spoon the sauce over to the edges, then cover heavily and haphazardly with sliced natural-casing pepperoni.

Preheat the oven to 450 degrees and bake 10 to 15 minutes until the pepperoni is cupped and charred and the bottom crisp.

Finish with a sprinkle of Romano and cut into squares with a mezzaluna.