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Monday, February 14, 2011

Stretching a little meat into a meal: Pizza, pizza


   Pizza is sooo great for stretching a little bit of meat into a meal. This pizza has only 2 leftover cooked sausage patties and about 1/4 cup of ham cubes on it, but it was oh, so yummy!
   When we first married, I bought frozen loaves of bread dough and would plunk a frozen loaf into a 13x9 pan before heading off to work in the morning. Well greased with shortening and then covered with a towel to keep it from drying out, the loaf of frozen dough would thaw enough by the time I got home around 4-5 in the afternoon for me to spread out for a pizza. Sometimes it would be warm enough in the house for the dough to raise, raise, raise before I'd get home, but I'd just punch it down, wait 10 minutes & then press it into the pan for pizza.
   In recent years, I'd taken to buying those inexpensive little pizza dough mixes found in the baking aisle. Super cheap & just about as quick as starting with thawed bread dough.
   Still make homemade pizzas--only difference is that I make my own crusts now (unrisen dough pictured here). For the recipe, go to Google books by clicking the link here which will take you to The Berghoff Café Cookbook. Once there, go to page 119 for the Homemade Pizza Crust recipe. Three sets of instructions are given for folks working by hand, with a food processor or with a stand mixer.
   Best part about it: this recipe makes TWO crusts, so I made two pizzas yesterday. One waits in the freezer for some lazy-don't-feel-like-cookin' day. For that pizza, I prebaked the crust a bit before loading it up with the sauce, onions, peppers, etc.
   Okay, time for my pizza confession! I like dousing my slice of pizza with Frank's RedHot Cayenne Pepper Sauce before eating it. YUM! What's your pizza obsession??

8 comments:

Tightwad Mom said...

You are a genius! Pizza is a great catch all for all kinds of leftover's. My family is crazy for dessert pizza, so I think I am going to try making one with home canned pie filling the next time I make pizza.

Anonymous said...

Your pizza looks delish!! I love mine with pepperoni and mushrooms.

Jessica said...

I don't like to mess around with yeast (fear of it not rising and ruining what I'm making...) so we have a pizza crust recipe that uses a can of Guinness instead of yeast :)

Alas, I don't really like pizza, since my body rejects cheese. I can think of other ways to eat tomato sauce and topping (usually accompanied by pasta) that I like much better.

Practical Parsimony said...

My favorite toppings are mushrooms and cheese. Just a bit of meat can make a meal in so many forms. I almost bought a Domino's after I read this. The "pizza" is made with two bread rounds and spaghetti sauce and cheese on top. I am afraid of making things with yeast...lol. But, you seem to have mastered the frozen pizza.

Pure Ella said...

Ahhh looks so good.
I quit pizza about 6 months so this is only punishment for me to look at ;(
Still love it - maybe I'll find one that's gluten free and vegan somewhere.... ;D
xo

Dmarie said...

sure love hearing from you guys!
@TW, hope to hear how that goes!
@Mel & Practical, I'm with you on the mushrooms!
@Jessica, we're not crazy about a lot of cheese, so sometimes I'll even make pizza with only parmesan, which is easy on tummies from what I understand.
@ella, I just may have to try a gluten free crust sometime but haven't heard good things about vegan cheeses. have you?

Lindy Mint said...

I used to buy the pre-made pizza dough at Trader Joes. I had tried making wheat pizza dough on my own, but with out fail it never rose.

Lately though I was willing to give it another go. I found an Emeril recipe on the Food Network website that worked! (white flour though, still too chicken to try wheat). It really is easy, if you give yourself an extra hour to let it rise.

I like my pizza with pesto and pine nuts. Mmm.

Dmarie said...

mmmmn, Lindy, that sounds good! I guess our favorite out of the box pizzas are BarBQ sauce & chicken pizzas, but will try pesto & pine nuts soon as basil season rolls around again. thx

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