First attempt at bread making - boules!

I decided to try out Meg's favorite technique for baking fresh bread (from the Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day book).  Not bad.  Maybe a little under-done. Will go get a thermometer to see if my oven temp needs to be adjusted.  

Basic ingredients ready to go

Dough mixed and ready for rising

Growing

Using plastic cutting board as a pizza peel

In the oven

Two.  Two wonderful boules!!   Mwa ah ah...

Thinking of making pizzas with the remaining dough along the lines of what Jim Lahey made in his kitchen at Co. on the Anthony Bourdain No Reservations "Obsessed" episode.

Pesto Pizza

Easy weeknight dinner:
pesto (basil, garlic, Parmesan, nuts, olive oil, salt, pepper)
mozzarella
fresh tomato slices
whole wheat pizza doughLoad up pizza dough with toppings, cook on super high heat for 10 minutes, devour, done.

White Swiss Chard and Artichoke Pizza

Imagine your favorite creamy spinach and artichoke dip- creamy, garlicky, full of veggies- but imagine it on a pizza. That's basically what this white swiss chard and artichoke pizza recipe is. I used Swiss chard because that's what the CSA was serving up this week, but I bet you could substitute spinach, kale, maybe even collard greens if you prefer. The only changes I made to the recipe was to use marinated artichoke hearts, to add a little pinch of red pepper flakes, and to forget to add the Worcestershire sauce. I put it on my go-to whole wheat pizza dough from the other Martha.

Asparagus Pizza

Mmmm... asparagus season continues, much to Tim's dismay and my delight.

Slice the asparagus thinly on the bias, mix up some chopped tomato with minced garlic, shallots, red pepper flakes, olive oil and salt & pepper. Throw it on whole wheat pizza dough with some mozzarella. Bake it super hot on a baking stone.
Good stuff.

BBQ Pulled Pork Pizza with Caramelized Onions and Blue Cheese

We had a plethora of delicious, artery-clogging treats at our Super Bowl party yesterday... so maybe the 21 lbs of slow-cooked BBQ pork shoulder was overkill?
We had a bunch of said pulled pork leftover, so Tim and I took a hint from a couple online recipes and made BBQ pulled pork pizzas with caramelized onions, blue cheese, mozzarella, and topped with some cilantro. Pretty good!
We may have overloaded the pizza with tasty, tasty meat, as it was a little floppy in the center, but otherwise pretty damn good.

Pepperoni Rolls for Tim

Tim has been talking about "pepperoni rolls" for months- apparently they're a childhood delight of his. I think he's secretly trying to find a suitable substitute for the pepperoni Hot Pockets he treasures so when he is three sheets to the wind.Conveniently, I made pizza earlier this week and had a bunch of dough leftover... so we gave pepperoni rolls a try. The internets are rife with pepperoni roll recipes, but they all differ- some leave out the sauce, some the cheese. I decided to base mine on a reliable source- yum! Good choice! I think the only change I would make is to add more pepperoni than called for in the recipe, to make the little guys more befitting of the name "pepperoni rolls." Other than that, I think these rolls are ready for center stage on Superbowl Sunday!!Served with a sassy lemon, Parmesan and arugula salad.

Butternut and Caramelized Onion Pizza

Wow, this pizza was pretty awesome... the sweetness of the butternut, creamy mozzarella, spicy/garlicky oil on the crispy crust, earthy sage and caramelized onions. Awesome.

Inspired by, but not adhering to these recipes, I whipped up a batch of the same pizza dough and used the same upside-down cookie sheet method I used a few weeks ago on my kale pizzas. Then I topped the pies with olive oil that had been marinating with red pepper flakes and a ton of garlic, laid thin slices of fresh mozzarella and roasted butternut squash, tossed on some caramelized red onions, and sprinkled it with minced sage, parsley and Romano cheese. So good with a green salad on the side!

White Pizza with Kale and Pepperoni

I had some leftover pizza dough after making some broccoli and mozzarella stromboli the other night (which were good, but messy and difficult to roll up!), so we decided to make a white pizza with crispy kale. Tim insisted that we also put pepperoni on it, because he's a man and men apparently need meat. The pepperoni was good, so I shouldn't complain. We also added some red pepper flakes in with the garlic oil that was spread on the dough. The goat cheese was a tasty and unexpected addition... the tang complemented the earthy flavor of the kale and the salty pepperoni.

I broke my baking stone a while back, so I decided to try a different method for getting a crispy pizza crust: I placed the rolled out dough on an upside-down baking sheet covered in a layer of cornmeal. I think using the baking sheet upside down let the air circulate around the crust a little more- I'd definitely use this method again!

Grilled Pizza

Last year, I was making some great pizzas, but in the process I was testing the oven's ability to handle extreme temperatures, bumping it up to 500 or 550 degrees, smoking myself out of the house and cracking baking stones left and right.

This year I decided to try a new method in the hopes that it would be easier on my cooking equipment and my nostrils... grilled pizza! I used this dough recipe from the Other Martha, and grilled it inside on my cast iron grill pan. it was really easy and really tasty. I rolled it super thin and it crisped up quite nicely. Still some smoke, but no cracked cookware!

Topped it with sauteed sweet cherry tomatoes, garlic scapes, mushrooms (all from the CSA), as well as some Italian sausage, mozzarella and basil.

Whole-Wheat Crust Pizza with Arugula, Prosciutto, Tomato and Mozzerella

Made these tasty arugula and prosciutto pizzas last week using the basic whole wheat dough from Healthy Breads in Five Minutes a Day... tasty, although a little poofier than I would have liked. I think I didn't preheat the pizza stone long enough because I was in a hurry.

BACON (and swiss chard) PIZZA!

This recipe is good stuff... worth almost smoking yourself out of the house with burning cornmeal.

Made with the olive oil pizza dough recipe from Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day, swiss chard from the CSA, and... wait for it... BACON!

Pizza for Grandmother's 95th...

We made pizza for Grandmother's 95th birthday. We used the dough recipe from ye olde bible of quick and easy bread-making, and improvised with our own toppings. Martha discovered how to not slide the pizza off onto the pizza stone (the key is low angle and small shimmy-shakes, NOT high angle and giant shove, which makes a calzone-like pile of dough and toppings, and sends the olives flying). They came out great, everybody loved them.

White pizza with marinated artichokes, mushrooms, prosciutto and kalamata olives (on mine, Theresa's and Martha's, at least).

Red pizza with Italian sausage and mushrooms (on half).

Goober Pizza

The cats took turns sitting/laying on this box for 24 hours.