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Thursday, November 29, 2012

Veggie Pizza


     We love pizza in our home (who doesn't?!). Pizza, however, isn't the most nutritionally sound meal. Insert- whole wheat crust and vegetable toppings! This pizza recipe has become one of our favorite ways to make pizza. Enjoy! 

Adapted from Taste of Home

Crust
     I cut the dough recipe in half. The original amount was for two 12-in. pizzas, and trying to make that fit into one was just too much. Also, I redistributed the whole wheat to all purpose flour ratio to offer a little more of the nutritional value of the whole wheat. This crust will be a thin crust style when finished. If you like thicker crust, then simply double the recipe.

3/4 c. all purpose flour
3/4 c. whole wheat flour
2 1/4 t. yeast
1/2 t. garlic powder (this is the secret to making this crust so delicious!)
1/4 t. salt
1/2 c. warm water (120-130 degrees F)
1 T. olive oil

1. Combine dry ingredients into bowl. Slowly add water and oil, and mix until dough comes together. Continue mixing with dough hook (or knead on flour surface if not using a stand mixer) until dough becomes smooth and elastic. 

2. Grease a second bowl. Place dough in bowl and turn to coat. Allow to rest until double (about 30 mins).

3. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. 

4. Roll dough onto baking stone (or whatever round bakeware you have). Roll about 3/4-1 in. over the sides, and then tuck the excess under to form the outer edge of the crust. Pierce dough thoroughly with a fork. Bake in oven for 8-10 minutes. 

5. Remove from oven and add sauce, toppings and cheese of choice. 

Sauce
     I didn't have much luck with the sauce recipe included in the original recipe. Ideally, I'd like to play with creating my own pizza sauce recipe from scratch. However, it is currently not tomato season and attempting such with out of season tomatoes would be equally bad. So, currently the pizza sauce I'm using is from a jar. 

Toppings
     I like my pizzas to be loaded with toppings, so I didn't cut the toppings portion of the original recipe in half. Actually, I don't care much to measure toppings. I simply put however many I think would suit our taste. We like the suggested zucchini, onions, bell peppers, and mushrooms. We also added olives the last time we made it. The possibilities are limitless, and that's the great thing about making your own pizza! If you'd like the specific measurements, then visit Taste of Home. One important step in preparing the toppings is to cook them a bit before you place them on the pizza. The zucchini, especially, needs to be the first item into the pan to cook down a bit or else you'll have crunchy zucchini pieces on the finished pizza. 

Final Steps
 6. Bake pizza for about 12 minutes or until crust is brown and cheese is melted. 

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2 comments:

  1. Great post! I've been meaning to try out a whole wheat crust recipe for our homemade pizzas. I'm pretty sure my husband won't have a problem with that, however, he would die if he even thought he had to eat veggies on a pizza! Lol, he loathes veggies! I'm hoping I'll be able to eventually get him to eat some but it is a sloooow battle!

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    1. Oh dear! Hmmm, you could: 1) cut them up really small 2) dice them really small or puree them into the sauce or 3) make sure there's plenty of cheese over them. Haha, that about all the ideas I have. How do you get around a loathe of vegetables? Keep going with expanding taste preferences (and I must say that pizza is a nice way of doing such. haha) :)

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