Recipe Revamp:Eggplant Pizza

Last summer I discovered the joys of putting eggplant on pizza, and while it's an absolutely amazing recipe in terms of gooey deliciousness, I found an even better one a few weeks ago that adds in even more levels of flavor to the pie. The za'atar I used I had brought back from Jordan, and this was really a great way to use it up.

The Sprouted Kitchen

Roasted Eggplant & Za'atar Pizza
Dough Recipe
2 c. bread flour
2 t. yeast
1 t. sugar
1 T. olive oil
1 c. warm water

Tahini Spread
3 Tbsp. Tahini
1 Tbsp. Lemon Juice
1 Clove Garlic, minced
Pinch of Salt + Pepper

1 Eggplant, peeled and sliced into 1/4" discs
2 tsp. Extra Virgin Olive Oil
Generous Pinch of Dried Oregano
1 Small Yellow Onion, in large slices
3/4 Cup Shredded Mozzarella
1 Tbsp. Za’atar
1/3 Cup Crumbled Feta
Fresh Thyme Leaves
Salt + Pepper

1. Preheat the oven to 500. Mix dough ingredients together and let rise for 30-45 minutes.
2. Mix all of the tahini spread ingredients together in a bowl, set aside.
3. Drizzle eggplant and onions in a roasting pan and toss with salt, oil, and dried oregeno. Roast for 15-20 minutes.
4. Once dough has risen, spread it out on a pizza stone and place the tahini spread across the surface, followed by the za'atar. Sprinkle the mozzarella, the eggplant chunks and charred onions, and the crumbled feta. Drizzle a bit of olive oil on top, and baking the pizza for 12-15 minutes until the edges crisp up. Garnish the top with a generous sprinkle of the fresh thyme leaves.

How to Grill a Pizza: Party Style

I've hosted pizza parties before, and while having 10-15 people over to make their own individual pizzas is fun, it has its down side too. Unless you have a large kitchen, crowding around a stove can turn a room into a messy sauna pretty quickly.

A perfect solution presented itself this weekend, when I was away at the lake for Labor Day. In a house without AC, I decided to finally give grilled pizza a try. Taking the party outside let everyone come and go from the grill as their pizza-making turn arose, but didn't have the claustrophobia of my kitchen.

I had heard a few stories about how to grill pizza from friends, who assured me placing a pizza directly on the grill would work. My instinct, knowing how my dough tends to be more on the sticky, gooey side, was that the pie would fall straight through the cracks of the grill, so to prevent this, I took my typical dough recipe and adjusted it slightly, using bread flour, and letting the dough rise for a full hour.

For the party, I also tripled the following recipe, and formed five smaller pizza balls from the group. Below are my notes, and pictures of my first efforts. Super thanks to my friends who had done this before and manned the grill, assuring me it would work.

Finished pizza--all in one piece!

Grilled Pizza Dough

• 1 c. warm water
• 2 t. yeast
• 1 t. sugar
• 1/2 t. salt
• 2 t. oil
• 2 cups bread flour plus more

1. Preheat the grill to a medium heat.
2. Mix the yeast, oil, and water together until combined, then add it to the bread flour. Stir together, or knead by hand, until dough forms a solid ball. Add more flour, up to another quarter cup, until it looses its sticky consistency and forms a ball.
3. Let rise for at least one hour, punch it down, and then work it into a flat dough, oiling your hands if necessary. A ball the size of your hand should flatten out to a medium pizza that is easily handled on the grill itself and serves up around 6-8 slices.
4. Oil the grill grates, and one side of the pizza. Place the oiled side onto the grill and grill until the dough moves easily around on the grill and has browning marks on its side.

   

   Dough on the Grill

5.  Oil the second side of the pizza, and flip it on the grill.
   

   

   Grilled Side Up

   
   
6. Working quickly, spoon the sauce and all toppings except cheese on the grill. Note: Grilling shortens the cooking time of veggies, especially bell peppers or onions, so if you like those less crispy, consider slightly sauteeing them before adding them to the grill.
   

   

   Add toppings directly to grill

7. Close grill cover and let the veggies cook on the pizza for 3-5 minutes. Move the pizza to the top rack if possible to avoid direct access to the heat and add cheese. Keep on grill until cheese melts, but be sure to watch the bottom and make sure it doesn't get too crispy.

Two pies cooking at once.

Pork Three Ways: Fancy, Easy, and BBQ Pizza

There's nothing like a large piece of meat to inspire creative cooking. When faced with 4 lbs. of pork shoulder, instead of making way too much of one dish--I split it up into three amazing dishes: Braised Pork Shoulder, Pork Ragu Pasta, and BBQ Pork Pizza. (Well, really four dishes, if you could the 3 lbs I used initially to make Christmas Tamales).

The genius part of this was that I only had to cook the meat once: braising it for 3 hours in onions, a HEAD of garlic, and a bottle of beer. The result was a tender, full of flavor bite of meat that will take me awhile to forget. It also froze back well---after a month in the freezer while I took my Jordan trip, the meat was still awesome.

Try one, or all three when you have a few hours to braise:

Pork Shoulder ready to braise

Braised Pork Shoulder
Martha Stewart
* 6 ounces pancetta, finely chopped
* 2 medium onions, thinly sliced
* 1 bone-in pork shoulder (6 to 7 pounds), room temperature
* Coarse salt and freshly ground pepper
* 2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
* 1 head garlic, minced
* 2 teaspoons fennel seeds, toasted and ground
* 1 teaspoon crushed coriander seeds
* 2 cups Belgian-style ale
* 1 cup homemade chicken stock

1. Preheat oven to 300 degrees. Crisp pancetta in a large Dutch oven over medium-low heat, until fat is rendered, about 10 minutes. Transfer to a plate using a slotted spoon.
2. Add onions to Dutch oven. Cook over medium-high heat, stirring occasionally, until caramelized, about 25 minutes. Transfer to plate using slotted spoon.
3. Season pork with salt and pepper. Add oil to Dutch oven, and sear pork, fat side down, until golden, about 5 minutes. Flip, and repeat.
4. Add garlic and spices to pot. Cook until fragrant, about 1 minute. Add ale, stock, pancetta, and onions; bring to a simmer. Transfer to oven, and braise pork, covered, basting every hour, until meat is falling off the bone, 3-4 hours.
5. Shred only the meat you are using for dinner using 2 forks, and drizzle with warm skimmed jus. (We served ours with mashed potatoes and stuffing)

Basting the meat after two hours

The oh-so-delicious jus

The pasta dish below would be a great next-day meal, but as I was flying to the Middle East, I choose instead of freeze back both the cooked pork and jus until my return. The following was insanely easy and took maybe 10 minutes of prep. The light egg noodles make it a fantastic pairing to the somewhat heavy braised meat already served.

Pork Ragu Pasta with Sage
Martha Stewart

* 1 pound egg noodles
* 2 cups jus, heated and reduced (from above)
* 2 cups shredded pork, heated
* 2 tablespoons fresh sage, thinly sliced
* Pecorino Romano cheese

1. Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Cook 1 pound ribbon pasta according to package instructions until al dente. Drain, reserving some cooking water.
2. Toss pasta with reserved jus, reserved shredded pork, and sage, adding reserved cooking water as needed.
3. Divide among 4 bowls. Garnish with finely grated Pecorino Romano cheese.

Pork Ragu

So the next recipe has a funny story to it. I wanted to use the last cup of pork to make pizza, so I glanced in the pantry---saw A1 Steak Sauce, and in my head went 'ah, Chris has BBQ sauce.' Come two hours later, when the pizza dough is on the piping hot pizza stone and all the ingredients are ready---I realize steak sauce is NOT barbecue sauce. (Head Slap).

BBQ Pork Pizza

BBQ Pork Pizza

But such errors make for the best creativity--and within minutes I had whipped together my own special sauce: one part A1, one part tomato sauce, and two heaping spoonfuls of adobo sauce (I had the chipotles in adobo in the fridge from tamales last month). What turned out was amazing: smokey, sharp, and a perfect compliment to the pork.

The recipe is my standard dough recipe , topped with the leftover meat, sauce, and a mixture of cheese. Cook at 450 degrees for 10-12 minutes, and serve.

Finished product

The best part about all of these was that the final recipe--the pizza--made almost a month after I initially braised the meat was just as good as the first thing I made. I take that as a sign of both delicious recipes AND a good product. It's a lot of pork, and the variety of recipes really shows off it's versatility. So what do you think? Do you have a go-to recipe that can pull out three amazing meals? Let me know!

Eggplant Pizza

So for all of my eggplant lovers out there, this recipe is a must. For those scared of eggplant, this is a great one to start out on. It didn't take a long to prep, and was so amazing, there were no leftovers after my roommates got a hold of it---so if that isn't a recommendation, I don't know what is.

I used my generic dough recipe, but if you want to cheap and buy a crust, that should work too.

Pizza Dough
1 c. warm water
2 t. yeast
1 t. sugar
1/2 t. salt
2 t. oil
-mix together in the water, then add to
2 cups all-purpose flour
-let rise for 30 minutes. This dough is sticky, so you have to knead it directly onto the pizza stone. Use oil on your hands to make kneading easy, and flour on the pizza stone surface.

Eggplant Pizza
1 large eggplant
3 oz. fresh mozzarella
2 T.  olive oil
2 T. minced garlic
1/2 t. dried hot red pepper flakes
Parmesan

1. Slice the eggplant into discs, salt generously, and let drain in a colander for 30-40 minutes.
2. In the meantime, make the dough and prep the rest of the ingredients.
3. Saute the garlic in oil with the red pepper flakes for 2-3 minutes.
4. Drizzle with oil and broil the eggplant on high for 5-8 minutes.
5. Heat Oven on 450-500 degrees. Place pizza stone in oven to preheat.
6. Spread out the dough, drizzle with oil, and layer the mozzarella and eggplant on the pizza. Don't add too much mozzarella, giving each piece plenty of space to expand. Shave Parmesan on top. Spoon garlic mixture on top.
7. Place pizza in oven for 12-15 minutes. After time is up and cheese has started to brown, shave another Parmesan layer on top and let sit.

Side Steps

So, as I reported earlier this week, I've been pretty hungry lately. At first I thought it was a vitamin deficiency, maybe not enough protein, but the other solution could be that I just wasn't eating enough. In that, normally, I make myself some giant, one-pot of deliciousness that I have no problem eating seconds, thirds, or the entire thing in one sitting.

Now, because I'm pushing myself to try new recipes, I am having trouble distinguishing between a one-pot meal, and something that requires more substance, or sides. The Eggplant Salad I made last week was delicious, but I should have added a grain or something to add to it. The same with the White Gazpacho. It's tricky teaching myself that not all recipes I make are a one-and-done type meal, but I think I'm getting the hang of it.

Tonight I made the shaved asparagus pizza (mozzarella is delicious, and I will SEVERELY hate life next week when I'm Vegan...) and then followed that with a Curried Cauliflower and Green Bean Salad with Lemon Yogurt. Both were FANTASTIC. First time all month I'd give myself an A for execution.

Shaved Asparagus Pizza

Curried Cauliflower and Green Bean Salad with Lemon Yogurt

Some tips:

• I bought a single serving cup of Greek Yogurt, it was the perfect amount for the yogurt sauce.
• My Pizza Dough recipe is my usual: 1 cup flour, 1/2 cup whole wheat flour, 1/2 cup corn meal, 1 cup warm water, 2 t. yeast, 1 t. sugar, 1 t. oil. Rise for 30 minutes. I like it because the whole wheat and corn meal gives it a heartier texture, and isn't as bready as other doughs.