Spinach & Broccoli White Pizza

I went a little nuts with the pizza dough recipe from Vegan Pizza, which meant Pizza Night twice in one week!  What you see below is actually two batches of the whole wheat version of Julie's dough, where I used 2 cups whole wheat flour and 1 cup unbleached white.  The rest of the recipe is exactly as written in the link above.

The inspiration for this particular pizza came from the leftovers that happened to be in my fridge at the time: One (1) container of Olivia's Organic Baby Spinach, and two (2) small broccoli crowns leftover from when I made Broccoli Mac and Cheese Casserole the night before. AND...for some extra cheesy goodness, I had already sliced open my free sample of Mozzarella Teese from Vida Vegan Con to use on The Rocket Pizza earlier in the week, so I had a good 3/4 of it left!  

I decided on a White Pizza: home made crust topped with a creamy garlic Alfredo base, then topped with lightly sauteed baby spinach, blanched broccoli, and lots of garlic, then finished with some strategically placed mozzarella slices.

Before I began, I preheated a pizza stone in a 500 degree oven. My pizza stone is the large round one from Pampered Chef, and it's best to let it preheat for a good thirty minutes.

For the sauce, I decided to tweak Julie's Smoky White Cheese Sauce recipe a bit, to stand in for the Alfredo on the pizza.  Basically, I omitted the "smoke" and added in 2 teaspoons of Italian seasoning.

Cheesy Alfredo Pizza Sauce (adapted from Julie Hasson's Smoky White Cheese Sauce)

1 cup almond milk, unsweetened

1 cup water

1/2 cup raw, unsalted cashews

1/4 cup nutritional yeast flakes

2 cloves garlic

2 Tbsp tahini

1/2 tsp salt

2 tsp Italian Seasoning

• In a blender, combine all the ingredients and blend well, until no bits of nuts remain.  Sauce should be very smooth.
• Add blended mixture to a sauce pan, and bring to a simmer over medium heat, whisking the whole while.
• Lower heat and continue to cook for another 10 minutes, or until it starts to thicken. Be careful not to burn.  The sauce with thicken more as it cools.

I set the sauce aside to cool while I cooked my greens and rolled out my dough. I quickly blanched my fresh broccoli florets in the microwave covered with a damp paper towel with 2 TBSP of water for about 3-4 minutes. I then sauteed the baby spinach in 1 TBSP of olive oil, 3 cloves minced garlic, and 1 tsp crushed red pepper (pepper can be omitted of your tongue can't take the heat). As the spinach wilted, I added the blanched broccoli to the pan, tossed everything together with salt and pepper to taste, then set aside to cool a bit.

The unbaked pizza

I had enough dough, sauce and toppings for two pizzas. I usually roll my dough out onto parchment paper on top of my cutting board, so I can quickly transfer the pizza and parchment right onto my preheated pizza stone without loosing too much heat from the oven. Once the dough was rolled out, about 1/4" thick, I used about 3/4 cup of sauce on each pizza, then topped each one with half of my garlicky spinach and broccoli. I then sprinkled a bit of nutritional yeast, and placed around 6-8 slices of Mozzarella Teese over top.  Finally, I baked each one in the oven for 11-12 minutes, or until cheese is melted and crust is golden.

So the next time you are craving something garlicky and green, why don't you give this delicious pizza pie a try ^_^

Bistro Broccoli Chowder - Hold the Parsnips...

Another fine and hearty soup from Appetite for Reduction, using one of my favorite vegetables of all time, BROCCOLI.  For anyone who does not have the pleasure of owning this fantastic cookbook, I found the recipe online here, at GoDairyfree.org.

Here in new England, the only "chowda" in most folks' bowls is clam.  For this recipe, however, we swap out our shelled friends for some broccoli, and leave behind the heavy cream and butter for some luscious potatoes and unsweetened almond milk.  Besides potatoes, the recipe calls for a parsnip, which is not one of my usual pantry staples.  Apparently, it is not Stop and Shop's either, which made me sad because I really wanted to try one in this recipe.  No parsnips to be found.

So, in steps a turnip, and we call it a day.  Turnip can be subbed in some recipes that call for parsnip.  It is described as having a "celery-like" flavor, which I thought would be perfect for a soup such as this one.

And, I was right!  This soup rocked.  Although the directions instruct you to puree HALF the soup and leave the rest a little chunky and thick.  I submerged my immersion blender in the soup pot, and literally  tapped the button, and within 6 seconds, the entire pot was pureed. So much for that... and so much for my Job Lot $15.00 immersion blender been cheap and crappy.

So, since the soup was now silky smooth, and a delightful shade of green. I decided to chop up a bunch of RAW broccoli to add some texture back.  Good call. The crunch of the raw broccoli added just the right body to the soup, and at 150 calories a serving, you can't go wrong.  Thank you, Isa.  This was a fabulous, low-cal lunch for a week. ^_^