Butter Garlic Pizza Crust Recipe

adapted from here

As you may know, we're pizza fans around here. I've been having a lot of fun trying to mix up the pizza every week so that it doesn't get old (even though I don't think pizza could ever get old). I've mixed up the toppings and the sauces, so I decided it was time to mix up the crust as well. I may never make it the old way again, the butter and garlic is soooo delicious. Like whoa.

Ingredients

1 cup water
1/2 tablespoon sugar
1 pkg active dry yeast
2 to 3 cups all purpose flour
1/2 cup whole wheat flour
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon dry oregano (or 1 teaspoon fresh, finely chopped)
1/2 tablespoon olive oil
4 tablespoons butter
1/2 tablespoon garlic salt 

Directions: 

1) Mix the water and sugar. Pour in the yeast and give it a stir. Let it sit for 5 minutes to allow yeast to activate.

2) In a bowl (I used my stand mixer bowl) combine the flours, salt and oregano (I used fresh simply because I actually had it in the house for once). Pour in the yeast mixture and oil. Stir until a dough ball forms (I used my dough hook attachment). Knead for 5-6 minutes, until the dough cleans the sides of the bowl. At this point, my dough was still way too sticky, so I ended up adding almost another whole cup of flour (1/4 cup at a time until I reached the correct consistency). Place in a bowl with a little olive oil, turning to coat, cover and allow to rise for 1 1/2 hours.

  3) Punch dough down. Place on a pizza pan that has been lightly brushed with olive oil. Melt the butter and stir in the garlic salt. Brush the entire crust with the garlic butter mixture. I also sprinkled it with the remaining oregano because I chopped a little more than I needed for the crust (you could, again, also use dried). 

4) Bake at 450°F for 5 minutes. Brush with any remaining garlic butter and add your sauce, cheese and toppings. Bake for an additional 10-15 minutes.

The toppings this time were tomatoes and bacon, plus mushrooms on his side because he's weird and likes to eat fungus. Can you see the butter oozing out from under the cheese? Yeah. Not the healthiest way to eat pizza, but damn if it's not tasty.

Oh hey! Before you go, you might want to skip on over to My New Favorite Outfit today. You may or may not find a guest post and a giveaway!

Weekend Recap

It's been awhile since we've had a weekend recap around here, so I figured it was time for another, since this past weekend was particularly fun.

Friday:

pizza night

We made chocolate chip cookies, and then when I turned my back, E snatched one. She might've gotten away with it, too, if she hadn't come up to me all proud saying "Look what I sneaked!" 

Also on Friday, I signed up for my second-ever run (a five-mile "mini-thon") in a couple months. I'm excited to have the extra motivation to get out and run again, because I've been pretty bad lately.

Saturday:

I successfully J. Crew rolled my sleeve! This is my going out outfit, apparently.

A friend had a chili party at his place Saturday night, so naturally I made cupcakes to bring, and the strawberry whipped cream to use as a frosting. And it was the most delicious thing ever. 

After the chili party, I went downtown with one of our friends to celebrate her 30th birthday. We had a few drinks, complained about how loud the music was, then went back to her place to drink wine in peace and laugh about how old we're getting.

This weekend was the first time I've been out in a very long time, and while it was nice to cut loose for a little bit, I definitely don't miss doing it all the time like I used to.

Sunday was spent recovering from Saturday (yet another sign of how old I'm getting) and realizing that I'm either coming down with something, or my allergies are setting in. All of yesterday and so far today, my throat has been sore and my nose stuffed up. I'm hoping it's just allergies and I can get it under control soon! I have no idea how my allergies act out here, so I guess we'll see.

Hoping you lovelies had a great weekend!

PS I almost forgot, I'm guest posting for my bloggy buddy Laura at I do deClaire while she is on vacation with her family, so head over there to see my "two ways to step up your mommy-on-the-go outfits" post!

Better Than Hawaiian Pizza

 I love pizza. It's a blank canvas for whatever sauce and toppings your little heart desires, and whatever flavor profiles you can dream up.

One of my favorites is the classic but delicious Canadian bacon and pineapple pizza, aka Hawaiian pizza. I wanted to come up with a "fancier" version, if you will, for our last pizza night, and here's the results:

Ingredients

pizza dough
and as much or as little as you want of these:
pizza sauce 
Canadian bacon
pineapple
spinach
feta cheese

Prepare your pizza dough, throw all the toppings on top, then pop it in the oven for about 15 minutes and enjoy.

This is the first time I've used feta on a pizza and I must say, it's a winner. It doesn't melt, but rather gets a little bit toasted on top, and the flavor goes oh so well with the Canadian bacon and pineapple.

 Did I mention I love pizza?

Spicy Cajun Shrimp Pizza

This pizza is basically this recipe in pizza form. I had the extra bell pepper, Cajun seasoning, and shrimp leftover from it, so it just made sense to throw it all on top of a pizza, right? This was also my first time using the whole wheat flour in the pizza dough, and it was actually pretty darn tasty!

Spicy Cajun Shrimp Pizza

pizza dough (my recipe here, except this time I subbed whole wheat flour for regular)
1 red bell pepper, chopped
1 clove garlic, minced
1 tsp Cajun seasoning
1/2 jar marinara sauce
1 cup cocktail shrimp
olive oil

Preheat oven to 450°. Get your pizza dough ready (be it homemade or store bought).

Heat up a skillet with about a tablespoon of olive oil. Saute the bell pepper and garlic until it becomes fragrant, about 2 minutes.

 Once the dough is spread onto the pizza pan, sprinkle the Cajun seasoning on top of the dough and rub it in a little bit. Spread the marinara sauce. Then add the pepper, garlic, and shrimp.

 Bake for 10 minutes, then top it all off with cheese and bake for another 5-10 minutes.

Enjoy! This was one of our favorite pizzas to date.  Nom nom nom.

Weekend Recap

This weekend was such a good weekend, I'm so sad it's over. Pizza (of course), hiking, a six-month-iversary (yes, we're dorks and celebrate month-iversaries), wine, the farmer's market... best weekend ever.

Friday: I threw together a last minute oh-crap-what-do-I-have-for-toppings pizza, a barbeque bacon pizza, with the obligatory spinach of course. We also went shopping for "adventure" gear for our hike the next day. That's how we got E excited for it, was to tell her we were going on an adventure. :)

Saturday: We got up early and caravan-ed with a few friends down to Big Sur, hiked about 3.5 miles up a mountain (I'm from Kansas, it was a mountain), then turned around and hiked the 3.5 miles back down. Four men, one woman, two dogs, and a three-year-old, and she was the only one of us not completely exhausted by the time we got back to the cars. And we barely had to carry her, she did about 90% of it all on her own! What a champ. After E was in bed, J and I watched The Hobbit (the first movie we saw together as a married couple), drank some wine, and toasted to being married for six whole months. I'm so lucky to be married to my best friend.

I went a little picture crazy, so if you care to see them, there are more after the cut...

"White" Pizza (Chicken with Alfredo Sauce) Recipe

I think I first had a "white" pizza at Old Chicago in Omaha. I had a boss who was really weird about marinara/tomato sauce (I think it gave him acid reflux) so he would always order his own pizza with white sauce on it. Anyway, I tried it, it was delicious. 

Recently I've been trying to think of ways to mix up our Pizza Fridays, so last week I tried one with bbq sauce, and this week I tried one with alfredo sauce. And let me tell you, they will both be in heavy rotation with the regular tomato sauce, just to mix things up. 

Pizza Dough (recipe straight out of the Kitchenaid mixer recipe book [with my notes in brackets])

• 1 packet active dry yeast
• 1 cup warm water (105° to 115°) [I went ahead and bought a cheap candy thermometer from Target, and it's made all the difference]
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 2 teaspoons olive oil
• 2 1/2 to 3 1/2 cups all-purpose flour [I typically find that my dough is good after the initial 2 1/2 cups]
• 1 tablespoon cornmeal [I tried this step for the first time on this pizza, but to be honest I prefer it without it, so from now on I will continue to omit this part]

Dissolve yeast in warm water in warmed mixer bowl. [I add a dash of sugar to the water and yeast at this point to help it activate, then let it set for 10 minutes.] Add salt, olive oil, and 2 1/2 cups flour. Attach bowl and dough hook to mixer. Turn to Speed 2 and mix about 1 minute.

Continue mixing on Speed 2, add remaining flour, 1/2 cup at a time, and mix until dough clings to hook and cleans sides of bowl, about 2 minutes. [Again, I typically find that my dough reaches the desired consistency without adding any more flour, except the occasional 1/4 cup.] Knead on Speed 2 about 2 minutes longer. [If you do not own a mixer with a dough hook, you'll have to do the kneading by hand. Or just buy pre-made pizza dough, I don't judge.]

this is about what it should look like after kneading

Place dough in greased bowl, turning to grease top. Cover. Let rise in warm place, free from draft, about 1 hour, or until doubled in bulk. Punch dough down. 

before rising...

after rising! magic!

 Brush a 14-inch pizza pan with oil. Sprinkle with cornmeal. [Again, I will be omitting this step, because the next step seems to mess it up.] Press dough across bottom of pan, forming a collar around edge to hold toppings. Add toppings as desired. Bake at 450° for 15 to 20 minutes. [I always bake everything but the cheese for about 10, then do the cheese for the last 5-10 because the husband doesn't like "burned" cheese, and I love him so you got it baby.]

Toppings 

• 1 chicken breast
• 1/2 jar of your favorite alfredo sauce 
• handful of spinach (optional, but I find it's a great way to sneak extra veggies in because you can't taste it very much)
• 1/2 bag shredded Italian mix cheese

I baked the chicken breast on 375° for about 25 minutes, until it was no longer pink in the middle. While that was going I spread out the dough, then spread the alfredo sauce on it. When the chicken was done, I cut it into bite-sized pieces then sprinkled it on top of the sauce. Then I added the spinach, and baked it for about 10 minutes. 

everything but the cheese

 At the 10 minute mark, I removed it from the oven, added just a touch more alfredo sauce, and sprinkled the cheese on top. We put the cheese on top of the toppings, but feel free to use whatever orientation of sauce to toppings to cheese your little heart desires. Then I baked the (now cheesed) pizza for another 5-10, until the crust was golden brown and the cheese was melted (but not browned). 

 

 Definitely a very tasty alternative to tomato sauce.

What's your favorite kind of pizza sauce? 

Weekend Recap

Friday: I made another new (to us) pizza for dinner (recipe tomorrow!). Super exciting. 

Saturday: We made the drive up to Sacramento so that E could see her dad for a few hours since he is deploying really soon. It’s a loooong drive, but it was worth it. We also visited a (military) friend of ours who was buried so recently they haven’t put his grave marker up yet. He was buried in the military section of the cemetery, near their Court of Honor. There’s something so sobering about being near a memorial like that, and we both got a little emotional. (I didn’t get any pictures from Saturday, but don't worry, I made up for it on Sunday.)

Sunday: was actually a really good day. I woke up way early, and carpooled up to the trail where the 10k was held with the two other girls I was running with. I was really nervous at the starting line, but I found a groove and actually finished at a faster pace than what I've been training at! It was exhilarating to  to cross that finish line. The only bummer was, J and E got lost on the way upt to meet me at the finish line and didn't get to see me cross. But we spent the rest of the day at the venue, which had a carousel, train rides, petting zoo, and all the fresh produce and locally made jams/salsa/wine you could want (the bountifulness of such things is probably my favorite part of being in California). It was a really cool place and we'll probably take her back out there sometime soon. Good wholesome family fun. :) And this may have been my first race, but I don't think it will be my last.

at the finish line!

showing off my medal

what are you doing up there, peacock?

I'm the dork who took a picture of a watermill

enjoying the carousel :)

my dusty shoes and "bib" number (we didn't get real ones, which was also kind of a bummer).

What about you? Did you try anything new this weekend?

Weekend Recap

Since E decided to be a holy terror the last three days, we spent as much time as possible out of the house (distractions for the win). At least there were some good moments sprinkled in so it wasn't entirely unbearable.

Friday: we went to the playground and had bbq pizza for dinner.

big girl slide

Saturday: we went to the playground again (just to get her out of the house), and taught her to fly a kite! I haven't flown a kite since I was a little kid but turns out kite-flying is a lot like bike-riding, it all came back and we had a blast with it (until she remembered that she was in a terrible mood, had a meltdown, and we had to go home).

first time kite flyer

Sunday: First, E woke us up with a pillow fight. If you've never been woken up by a 3 year old hitting you with a pillow, it's kind of hilarious (minus the rude awakening part). Then she decided she was Batman, J was Green Lantern and I was Green Arrow, and refused to call us anything else the rest of the day. The weather was too gross to do anything outside, so I suggested we all go to McDonald's for lunch and she could play in the play place. Turns out the one we went to had an outdoor play place instead of an indoor one. Womp womp. We took her out there anyway just for a few minutes, and she wouldn't go down any of the slides or anything, so it was a moot point anyway. When we got home, we set up our tent in the living room and watched movies until dinner. She got in trouble for not finishing her dinner, so at bath time I took away all her bath toys. Next thing I know she is playing with her washcloth pretending it's a mermaid. Imagination- 1, Mommy- 0.

pillow fight

watching movies in the tent

All in all, not a terrible weekend. I hope yours wasn't terrible either. Happy Monday!

Friday night is Pizza night

bbq chicken pizza, adapted from here

Friday night is homemade pizza night around here. Last night I tried a bbq pizza for the first time and it was nom-alicious.

That's all I've got for now, happy weekending!!