BBQ Chicken Pizza

Around July 4th, you're supposed to inhale copious amounts of BBQ. Well mine has arrived in the form of pizzaaaaaa! Yes we're at it again - another pizza cooking adventure! This time a riff off of California Pizza Kitchen's world famous BBQ Chicken Pizza. (Who doesn't love this CPK treasure?!?!) I've been eating it for as long as I can remember. Lucky for me B is a big fan of it too. 

Anyways this was such an easy meal to whip up especially since I had a treasured Trader Joe's pizza dough in the freezer. (Note it comes refrigerated but I bought a few during my last visit for the sole purpose of freezing to see how they freeze. Still perfect after a defrost!) We made this pizza without a real amount of cheese but you can easily add that in. B wanted a little bit of cheese so our compromise was to sprinkle Parmesan cheese on top once it was baked. The BBQ sauce, caramelized onions and chicken really have a lot of flavor so the traditional amount of cheese was not missed. Try it out today!

Buffalo Cauliflower Pizza

Well hellooooo! I might just get back to blogging after a nearly four year hiatus. The reason...this pizza! Hot damn this Roasted Buffalo Cauliflower Pizza (by the Savory Vegan) was one of the most delicious pizza I have ever made! (And I've made a lot of pizzas in my time).

We came to this pizza because B and I both love our veggies. We substitute veggies in place of meat in a lot of recipes. (But don't get me wrong I love a good steak and burger!) We also love pizza, but since I try to avoid dairy 98% of the time, I'm always looking for a good pizza without cheese. (Clearly I am in the camp that the best part about pizza is the crust and not the cheese...mmmmm bread, I love bread.) This buffalo cauliflower pizza hit the spot and B even remarked, "I don't miss the cheese!" We inhaled this pizza and already discussed other variations. Next up, Buffalo Chicken Pizza (the same as above but with chicken) and riffs on the California Pizza Kitchen BBQ Chicken Pizza (one with chicken and one with cauliflower!)

p.s. I think my best move here was using Trader Joe's pizza dough - so much quicker than making my own from scratch.

See the full recipe here: Roasted Buffalo Cauliflower Pizza by the Savory Vegan.

Pancetta and Asparagus Flatbread

When my mom visited nearly two months ago, I gave her a stack of recipes and asked her to pick out a few dinners. Imagine my surprise when she selected this Pancetta and Asparagus Flatbread recipe that I'd been wanting to make for months. The combination of fresh asparagus, pancetta and homemade dough made this flatbread very memorable. 

White Pizza with Broccoli and Potato

Last month's supper club theme was Green, Potatoes & Guinness in honor of St. Patrick's Day. However by the time the day rolled around I had no clue what to make...none what so ever. So I do what every pretend famous chef does, I turned to my trusty yet to make recipe folder and stumbled upon a recipe for broccoli rabe, potato and rosemary pizza. Decision made! 2 of the 3 ingredients and I was convinced this was a healthy, and fancy, pizza. Of course by the time I went to the store I didn't have the ingredients written down so I went off of memory and ended up leaving the store with a bag of frozen broccoli, a few yukon gold potatoes, shredded mozzarella cheese and fresh pizza dough. While I had hopes of some fancy pizza, I ended up with a very budget, but still impressive and tasty, alternative. 

Naan Pizza

I was away on a work trip and when I got back, I developed a cold of some sort, so not much cooking going on in my kitchen! So today's recipe, Naan Pizza, is from my arsenal of recipes I've yet to post.  We all know I love homemade pizza so in the interest of making a very quick pizza, voila I present naan pizza! All you need is your favorite pizza toppings and a package of naan from Trader Joe's (or any other grocer's brand).

Weeknight Pepperoni Pizza!

By now you know, I like making pizza. Here's my latest traditional pizza I made the other night for an impromptu dinner with a few of my friends! 

All of the ingredients came from Trader Joe's: whole wheat pizza dough, spicy tomato sauce, pepperoni and mozzarella cheese. The Trader Joe's pizza dough is the best - all you have to do is roll it out and shape it how you want - much easier than making the dough from scratch.

Spiced Pear Flatbreads with Goat Cheese & Mustard Cream

The thing about travel, whether it be short or long or for fun or work, you can't help but feel out of it. I've been out of town a lot lately so to readjust, I decided to cook dinner for some friends last night. Plus it had the added benefit of seeing and holding two of the newest little ladies to the club! I swear any dinner party with the girls, is instantly more fun when the babies get to come along for some quality bonding time!

Seeing that I didn't have much time to plan the dinner, I quickly glanced through my Bon Appetit emails the day before for recipes that were vegetarian, different and easy. My first choice: spiced pear flatbreads with goat cheese and mustard cream. (The original recipe can be found here.) The picture looked delicious, the directions appeared to be easy and who doesn't love flatbread? Plus, the recipe comes from a local restaurant that has been named one of top ten new restaurants in America. Translation....I knew it would be a winner!

The result was a satisfying and light starter. The flatbread was crisp and thin. The arugula and pears complimented each other well and essentially provided a salad for us before the main meal. And the mustard cream sauce was beyond words delicious, in fact a few of us wanted to drink it straight from the bowl!

Pizza

I think I have a chemical imbalance. Or maybe adult ADD. After a very very long, grueling and headache inducing week all I wanted to do was veg out. But somewhere between walking Chloe and making pizza dough, I realized I was not vegging out, but instead making something from scratch that I've never made before but I easily could have ordered. I didn't even realize what I was doing until it was too late! And to top it off, the only sensical thing I could think of to do while waiting for the dough to rise for over 80 minutes, was to clean my apartment. Issues...serious issues.

Friday nights have always been pizza night from as far back as I can remember. It was always a fight on where to order from as Columbus has some great pizza places - Donatos, Rubinos, Bexley Pizza Plus to name a few. But the Tidwell staple no matter where it comes from is sausage, pepperoni and banana peppers. But that's not to say other kinds can't hit the spot - it depends on the mood I'm in or whoever I am with. You can almost put anything on pizza and you'll have a winner. Just be careful when ordering in another language - one of my first nights in Italy, we ordered a pizza thinking it was one thing and ended up with a pizza with baby shrimp. Baby shrimp freak me out so that was a disaster. But back to the adventure - pizza 100% from scratch!

All you need: active dry yeast (1/4 ounce), unbleached all purpose flour (2 and 3/4 cups), salt, olive oil, cornmeal, pizza sauce and toppings. Mix the dry yeast and a small teaspoon of sugar in warm water. In a separate bowl mix flour and salt to blend together. Then pour in the yeast mixture and oil and mix until a dough forms. The dough should not stick to your fingers, if it does, add more flour and mix again. Place the dough in an lightly oiled bowl and cover with plastic wrap and sit out for 40 minutes. Then, fold the dough a few times, recover and let rise for another 30 minutes. Preheat oven to 450. Take dough and knead on a lightly floured surface and form a ball.
Meanwhile sprinkle a pizza stone or baking pan with cornmeal (don't over do it). Stretch or press the dough into the shape you desire, working from the center outward. Spread sauce over the dough and arrange your desired toppings over the pizza. Sprinkle with seasonings. Bake for 15 minutes, cut and serve! Not as thin as I prefer, but not a bad start for my first attempt.


Until I can swing this purchase, a handcrafted terra cotta oven, I will continue to learn on my pizza stone - a great stocking stuffer from my mom last year!