Corn and Tomato Pizza

I love great tasting homemade pizza and this one is no exception. For the pizza dough, I defrosted some frozen wheat pizza dough I had previously made following this recipe. Otherwise you can use pre-made pizza dough to save you time. As for the topping, I got the inspiration from this Vegetarian Times recipe, with a little bit of my own variation. For the base sauce, I made some basil and cashew pesto, and left out the cheese altogether. It still tasted great.



Corn and Tomato Pizza

makes 2 medium pizzas

Pesto:
3/4 cup of cashew nuts (or almonds)
1 cup of packed basil
1 garlic, peeled
1 tablespoon freshly squeezed lemon juice
1/3 cup of olive oil
salt

In a food processor, grind the cashew nuts.
Add the basil, garlic, and lemon juice until pureed.
Next add in the olive oil until thoroughly mixed.
Season with some salt to taste.

Topping:
1 cup of chopped tomatoes
3 cups of sweet corn
3-4 tablespoons of fresh basil, torn
1 cup of spinach, cooked in boiled water for just a few minutes (optional)

1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.
2. Shape the dough to approx 12 inches large.
3. Spread on the pesto sauce, then top with corn, tomatoes, and spinach. Place on a pizza stone or baking pan. Bake for 10-12 minutes or until crust is crispy. Approximately 1-2 minutes before the pizza is done, sprinkle on the basil and continue to bake until crust is just about done!

Homemade Tomato Soup

I made this for dinner the other night - it was very nutritious and tasty! I would definitely recommend doubling the recipe next time for leftovers. Instead of the 3/4 cup of oil which I think was a bit excessive, I used about 2-3 tablespoons of olive oil, and substituted great tasting vegetable broth instead of chicken broth.

Homemade Tomato Soup Recipe

Pad Kee Mao

One of my favorite thai dishes is pad kee mao. This is one of those dishes I like to make at home without having the need to go to a thai restaurant. You can buy the fresh rice noodles from asian markets. You an get them precut, but I prefer to get them uncut so I have the luxury to slice them however thick I want. Of course, it's a bit more work, but worth the effort if you want wider noodles.

Makes approx 4 servings

1 lb of fresh rice noodles, precut, or uncut (cut to your liking)
2 tablespoons of vegetable oil
1 egg

Chopped ingredients:
4 cloves of garlic, chopped
1 small onion, chopped
3 tomatoes, chopped with seeded and juices squeezed
1/2 cup of basil (red basil preferred but I used sweet since I had that on hand)
2-3 cups of greens (spinach or swiss chard)
1 bell pepper, sliced (optional)
14 oz cubed firm tofu, drained

Sauce:
2 tablespoon light soy sauce
1 tablespoon dark soy sauce
1 teaspoon oyster or mushroom sauce
1 tablespoon sugar

1. Separate the rice noodles - rinse under hot water for about a minute to help separate out the strands. If they are uncut, unfold them and cut into 1-2 inch widths. Place in a large bowl.
2. In a small bowl, combine all the sauce ingredients.
3. In a large wok or pan, add the 1 tablespoon of oil over high heat.
4. Add in the tofu and cook for 1 minute.
5. Add the remaining oil. Add the egg and cook until slightly done.
6. Add in the onions, garlic, bell peppers, tomatoes, and greens adn cook for 1 minute.
7. Next, add the rice noodles and sauce mixture.
8. Add the basil. Stir fry for about 3 minutes. Serve!

Summer Cucumber Salad

Here's a refreshing and quick salad using the finest local ingredients (except for the California avocados).

1 medium-large cucumber, sliced
2 avocados, diced
2 medium tomatoes, diced
1 juice of lime
1/4 of fresh lemon
handful of cut cilantro

Makes 4 servings.

In a medium bowl, dredge the avocados in lemon juice for a few minutes.
In a large bowl, mix the sliced cucumbers and tomatoes. Add in the lime juice and salt to taste.
Finally, fold in the avocados and cilantro.

Vegetarian Enchilada

I’ve been looking for a vegan enchilada recipe that doesn’t compromise on taste and I think I’ve found one pretty close to it. Be forewarned – this dish requires some prep time so give yourself plenty of time. Your efforts will definitely be paid off with some excellent tasting enchiladas. I actually made this on a sweltering hot 95 degree Sunday evening – what was I thinking? My mind got the better of me! You can prep all the veggies the day before (zucchini, tomatoes, corn, onions). The recipe isn’t too involved, but the roasting, stuffing the enchiladas, and baking will take up most of the time.

For the recipe, click here. Makes about 6 servings. You can easily add your own meat to the filling.

Here are the ingredients I used. I actually omitted the chipotle in adobo sauce. I used some mild chili sauce instead of opening a new can. Also, I didn't use any “chik'n strips”, as the recipe calls for, and instead added the sour cream filling from the recipe review.

Cauliflower Curry (aloo gobi)

I love curries! This recipe uses cauliflower that's in season and yellow storage potatoes I had in the fridge for a few weeks. Inspired by the below recipe. Though aloo gobi is traditionally a dry curry dish, I made some modifications to it to have a little more gravy. This makes for great leftovers for the next couple of days.

Cauliflower Curry Recipe
Serves 4-6

1 medium yellow onions, diced
2 medium potatoes, cut into small cubes
1 small head of cauliflower, cut into bite-sized pieces
1 garlic clove, chopped
1 inch ginger, chopped
2 teaspoon cumin powder
2 teaspoons coriander powder
1 teaspoon garam masala
1/2 teaspoon turmeric
2 medium tomatoes, diced
1/2 cup water or coconut milk (if you want a heavier gravy)
1 tablespoon oil

Below are all of the ingredients chopped beforehand.

1. In a food processor, blend the garlic, 1 of the chopped onions, and ginger together.
2. Heat a teaspoon of oil in a large pot over medium-high heat.
3. Cook the remainng 1 chopped onions with a half teaspoon of salt until they are soft and translucent.
4. Add the ginger, garlic, onion mix, cumin, coriander, garam masala, and tumeric and cook for a minute to release all of the flavors.
5. Add the tomatoes until soft (about 1-2 minutes).
6. Add the cauliflower and potatoes cook until it is also browned in spots (about 15 minutes).
7. Stir in the water/coconut milk. Taste the curry and adjust with other seasonings as desired.

A Tale of Two Pizzas

It's been a while since I made pizza at home. Having a craving for homemade pizza, I decided to take a little adventure in making my own pizza dough and topping. After scouring the internet for pizza dough recipes, I finally settled on this recipe from The Fresh Loaf. I was able to make 4 - 12 inch pizza crusts from this recipe. I ended up freezing two and baking two of them that day. The crust was just perfect - gives you just the right amount of crunch. Instead of the 5 cups of all purpose flour the recipe tells you to use, I substituted one of the cups with whole wheat flour.

I also didn't want a typical pizza with cheese and tomato sauce so I found two great recipes to try. They are both healthy, nutritious and quite filling (no cheese). I used the spinach and spring onions from my CSA box, but feel free to top it off with any of your favorite vegetables. Yum!

Tuscan White Bean Pizza
So as you can see below, the entire pizza isn't tuscan white bean. Since I ran out of the cannellini bean mixture, I had to improvise and whipped up some onions and spinach for the remaining 25% of the pizza! :P

Carmelized Onion & Spinach Pizza

Salads Galore!

I didn't intend to make a dinner full of salads but it just happened to come out that way! It was a great way to clear a lot of veggies I had in the frig. Can you say salad buffet? I guess you can call it summer cleaning. It's great for a hot summer evening to cool you off after a warm day out.

Here was my dinner - Roasted Beets Salad, Broccoli Mix Salad with dressing, and Lettuce Salad.

The broccoli salad was delicious! The combination of broccoli sprinkled with some gala apples, crisy shallots, and red onions topped with the almond butter-based salad dressing was actually quite filling and flavorful. I didn't have any walnuts on hand (the recipe had called for it) but it was still great. Next time I will definitely need to add it to the mix! Here's the close up of the salad. Yummm! :)

Easy Lettuce Salad

This is a very healthy and refreshing lettuce salad that you can easily make in minutes!

Ingredients:
1 medium head of lettuce (I used red leaf, but you can use a variety of lettuce types)
2-3 avocados, sliced into 1/2 inch cubes
2 medium carrots, julienned
2 tomatoes
1-2 T balsamic vinegar
2-3 T extra virgin olive oil
hard boiled eggs (optional)

Serves about 4.

Wash the lettuce leaves and spin in a salad spinner to remove excess water. Tear the leaves into bite size pieces. Combine the remaining ingredients into a large bowl and serve!