Instead of a Pizza Tower review, here is a recipe for a Peppino Pizza-style pie, sure to satisfy any craving.

For the dough you will need:
2 Cups Flour
1 Cup Water
2 Tablespoons Oil (Olive is my choice)
1 Tablespoon Sugar
2 Teaspoons Yeast
1/2 Teaspoon Salt
Dried Basil or Oregano (optional)

Measure out 1 cup of your flour and put it in a bowl with your sugar, salt, and yeast. Next, pour in your water and oil and mix while adding 1 additional cup of flour until the dough is only slightly sticking to the sides of the bowl, such that it maintains its shape when you peel it from the side, but is not too firm. Your dough still needs to rise. Transfer your dough to a lightly oiled bowl, then find a dish towel and dampen it with warm water, and use it to cover said bowl until your dough ball doubles in size…

It’s not doubling in size, is it? It never has for me before. It always sat there, slightly puffing up to a pathetic degree where I could barely tell it had yeast in it. Did I maybe forget the yeast? Did I waste all of these ingredients for nothing? No. “Maybe my ingredients weren’t good enough”, said the clueless pizza chef. It is a poor musician who blames his instrument, and a poor cook who blames his ingredients. It is me. It was always my fault.

After about 20 minutes your pizza dough is ready to be formed. Take the ball out of the bowl and use a rolling pin or your hands to form the pizza into whatever shape you desire. Place the resulting shape onto your baking surface of choice. Top with dried herbs if you desire

I was never the best at shaping pizzas. My circles were always oblong, or had tapering ends somewhere. Imperfections are my enemy. Every crack and crevice in my formed dough is a showcase of my resentment. I cannot fix them; fingerprints showcase not an eye for detail, but a shameful display of damage control.

For your sauce you will need:
1 can Tomato Paste
4 Large Tomatoes
1 Cup Water
1 Garlic Clove
1 Teaspoon Sugar
1 Teaspoon Oil
1 Teaspoon Tears
Ground Black Pepper to taste

Get a saucepan ready and put it over medium heat as you pulse down your sliced tomatoes in a blender until they resemble the site of a horrific accident. Make sure you cry your tears into the blender adding in your requisite salt and some moisture. Next, add in the rest of your ingredients until blended together, then bring it to your saucepan and make sure you keep an eye on it.

The sauce is always the most underrated part of a pizza. It is the crust that lays out your foundation, giving your pizza either a spongy softness or robust crispiness that the rest of your pie builds off, and is the make or break of any recipe. Your toppings are the main attraction, and they are the choice of the customer, their way to say what they want to see of your creation. The sauce, however, is what holds these other two together, and the chef has more autonomy over this than anything else in his pizzeria. How you make your sauce is what makes a pizza yours. When I was told this by my master, I toiled day and night trying to make a sauce that I could comfortably say was mine. The anxiety proved too much for me to handle, and in my frustration I cried into my saucepan. In my suffering I found my purpose, my uniqueness, my sauce.

While your sauce is on the stove, preheat your oven to 475 Degrees Fahrenheit. Let your sauce reduce until it is roughly the consistency of applesauce.

For your toppings:
It is up to you
Only you know what you want
Only you can fill the gaping hole
Only you can finalize your creation
Only you can climb the Pizza Tower

After applying sauce to your dough, lay down a bed of mozzarella cheese to start your topping journey.

I put cheese, mushrooms, tomatoes, sausage, and pineapple on my first pizza. I remember it like it was yesterday. It felt like the best thing I had ever eaten in my life. Everything before and after it could never compare. It sent me on a chase to reach the same high I felt at that moment, yet the longer I go, the lower I fall. Will it ever be good enough? Will I ever be good enough?

Place your pizza in the oven and bake for 13 minutes.

Watch the pizza as it bubbles on the edges.

Bake for an additional 2 minutes.

Watch as the cheese turns from yellow to brown.

Bake for an additional 3 minutes.

Watch as the toppings curl in on themselves.

Bake for an additional 5 minutes.

Watch as your prized sauce dries out.

Bake for an additional 10 minutes.

Watch as your crust blackens and smolders.

Bake until the smell of your failure becomes too intense to handle anymore.

As you retrieve your pizza from the oven, recall all of the times you tried to be like your peers. Recall all of the praise they got, while you were never recognized for your effort. Recall all the people who spat out your food, said you would never amount to anything. Recall your sleepless nights spent trying and trying to emulate something, or someone, you wanted to recreate, but knew deep down you could never be as good as the original.

Take a bite of your creation. Revel in it, savour the flavour. No matter how repulsive the final product is to everyone else, you love it. You love it not because it is good, but because it is yours. Only you could create this, and only you could appreciate everything that went into your pizza.

tl;dr: this game ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ rocks. 9/10

so damn goated

i love pizza tower so much