Pizza

Like most Americans I love my pizza. It has been one of the most fun to change to fit my new eating habits. I really enjoy being able to taste all of the different veggies rather than having most of the flavor covered up by mountains of cheese.


Pizza Dough
1 1/3 cups warm Water
1 packet of Active Dry Yeast
3 1/2 cups Whole Wheat Flour
3 tbsp Extra Virgin Olive Oil (divided)
1/4 tsp salt (James actually salted his pizza because he thought this wasn't enough but I like things a lot less salty than he does)


In a large bowl add the Active Dry Yeast to the water. Let set for 5 min. until the yeast had dissolved.
Mix in flour, 2 tbsp of Extra Virgin Olive Oil, and salt. Knead for 10 min. I personally knead it by hand right in the bowl. After kneading, form it into a ball. I then drizzle 1 tbsp of Extra Virgin Olive Oil over the dough turning it over once so it is completely covered. Cover with a clean dish towel and let it rise for 1 1/2 - 2 hours.

 Sometimes I'll use all of the dough spread out over 1 baking sheet. This makes it more like a bread crust.

This time I divided the dough in half to make two thinner crust pizzas. I shape them by hand until they look right.

Oil a baking sheet and place shaped dough on it.

Then top them any way you like.

This time I used canned tomato sauce sprinkled with oregano, caramelized onions, mushrooms, green/yellow/red peppers and spinach. ( I don't think I'll be adding the spinach again it was kinda bitter)



 Happy Eating:)

Falafel, Pitas, and Salad

For the last week I've been in a funk. I've been uninspired and I haven't made very many dishes that have been tasty enough to share. I guess eating out so much the last month has made me really lazy in the kitchen. I think a lot of what I was feeling was because I was trying to finish up random stuff that was in my fridge. But I just went to the store so I have a whole kitchen full of stuff I'm excited to eat. I also picked up some new to me foods which include TVP (textured vegetable protein) and Bulgur (a grain). I'm very much looking forward to seeing how I like them.

While I haven't spent a lot of time in the kitchen I have spent a lot of time in our backyard. While my parents were here my dad helped me set up a nice little potted (I rent so I didn't want to put anything in the ground) garden. I have tomato plants, strawberries, zucchini, asparagus, sweet basil, lemon basil, parsley, cilantro and chives. I wanted to start small because I'm new at this but I kinda got carried away :)


James did have a request for falafel this week. I used a mix so there isn't a recipe.

For lunch the day after I made the falafel I crumbled it over a salad.

And using the left over pita I made a sandwich with beans.

Happy Eating!

Stir Fry

I was blessed this last week to have a house full of family and friends. For Easter I tried out new recipes on my family. They were all a success, but the recipes need a little tweaking before I debut them on "I Don't Miss Bacon". So be on the lookout for Wild Rice Salad with a Lemon Ginger Dressing, Slow Cooker Beans, and maybe even Carrot Cake. My unsuspecting guinea pigs favored the Wild Rice Salad so that will be the first to get the kinks worked out. (I really need to measure better when I'm creating dishes so I can recreate them)

Before all the craziness of last week happened I was able to put together a stir fry. Using what I could scrounge up in my kitchen this is what I came up with.

Stir Fry
1/2 a head of Broccoli
1/2 a head of Cabbage
1 Onion
2 Zucchinis
1 Summer Squash
4 Garlic Cloves
1/4 cup Veggie Broth
salt and pepper to taste

I chopped everything up, cooked it in veggie broth instead of oil for a lighter meal and served it over brown rice.

I added the cabbage last. This was before cabbage was added.

Is it just me or do other people also love super close ups of  food?

Not real exciting just everyday sort of  food.

Happy Eating :)