Mini Christmas tree pizzas recipe

'Homemade pizza is a firm favourite in our house but we always stick to a round shape, although I've never achieved a perfect circle! However, for these cute festive pizzas I dusted off my largest Christmas tree cutter and put it to work. I was surprised by how easy it was to create the trees and how they kept their shape perfectly once cooked. Even the youngest child will be able to get involved with each step of this simple recipe and they will be so proud to serve them up at dinner time for the whole family to enjoy. My four year old also insisted on putting a Christmas tree pizza in his lunchbox too!' says our mummy blogger Anneliese.

Ingredients

• 225g plain flour
• 2tsp fast action dried yeast
• 1tsp sugar
• 1tsp salt
• 150ml tepid water
• 100g (approximately) red pepper pesto. You can also use green pesto, passata or chopped tomatoes.
• 25-30g mature cheddar, finely grated
• ½ green pepper, sliced into strips
• 1 tomato, sliced into strips
• 10-15g sweetcorn (optional)

You will also need a Christmas tree cookie cutter - mine measured 5 inches in height

Method

1. First of all you, will need to make the pizza dough so grab a large mixing bowl and ask your child to help weigh in the plain flour, yeast, sugar and salt.
2. Once all the dry ingredients are in the mixing bowl, carefully pour in the tepid water.
3. Use a wooden spoon to give the mixture an initial mix. Now, roll up your child's sleeves and let them loose! They can use their hands to bring the dough together to form a ball.
4. Place the ball of dough onto a floured worktop and knead for 8-10 minutes. You can take it in turns with your little helper to push, pull and prod the dough!
5. Once the dough as been pummelled for up to 10 minutes, it should be smooth and elastic. Place the dough into a clean bowl and cover with a piece of cling film or a clean tea towel and leave to rise for 45 minutes to an hour.
6. When the time is up, your dough should have doubled in size and your little chef will be suitably impressed!
7. It's now time to preheat your oven, so set it to 220C/gas mark 8.
8. Take the pizza dough and give it a quick knead on the floured worktop, then take your rolling pin and roll out the dough. You will need a bit of elbow grease as it has the habit of springing back!
9. The rolled pizza should measure roughly 3mm thick and then you can use your Christmas tree cutter to cut out the shapes.
10. Place your 'naked' Christmas trees onto a lightly oiled baking tray.
11. You will need 1 teaspoon pesto for each tree. Perhaps you could share the task of spreading the pesto onto the dough with your child, by each having a teaspoon.
12. Once the pesto has been spread over each tree, sprinkle over the grated cheese
13. Now it's time to decorate your tree. However, instead of tinsel, you'll be using pepper and tomatoes, while the sweetcorn can be the baubles! The pepper and tomatoes will shrink in size while cooking, so be sure your slices are fairly thick to allow for this.
14. Place your decorated trees into the oven to cook for approximately 15-20 minutes. If you have used a different shaped cutter, bear in mind that you may need a longer or shorter cooking time, so keep a close eye on them.
15. Once out of the oven, you can tuck in straight away. They are absolutely delicious warm but still very nice eaten cold for lunch the following day!