Pesto Pizza Pinwheels

Hubbs and I both love pizza.  I mean, who doesn't?  We definitely love the convenience of buying out, and when we lived in Brooklyn, we bought pizza out a lot.  Most of the pizza places we frequented were just small local stores using homemade, good ingredients, so we didn't have to worry about it. I know there are places here in Michigan, but they are not as convenient to get to as we would like.  We have to get in our car and drive to get the pizza (we just walked there on the way to our house from getting off the subway in Brooklyn), and we might as well just make it ourselves - control the ingredients and use exactly what we want.  

We end up making pizza about once every week to week and a half.  This time when I made it, I decided to try something different and fun - pinwheels.  I've seen them for years, but have never made them before.  I had some extra pesto in the freezer from last summer when we had our bountiful basil crop, so decided to use that.  These turned out really good!  We dipped them in hot marinara sauce.  Yum!  My little brother came over when I was making them and hinted that they looked great.  I gave him several of them, which he promptly dipped in ranch!  He literally puts ranch on everything - even in the sauce when he makes his lasagna.  Funny kid!  These could work with any combination.  They would also be great for a party or a get together.  

 

 

 

Freshly baked pesto pizza rolls

Ingredients:

Pizza Dough (I use this recipe.  Use half for these rolls and freeze the remaining half for later.)

Pesto Sauce
Vegan Cheese

Toppings:
 - Green Peppers
 - Onions
 - Baby Spinach
 - Kalamata Olives
 - Pickled or fresh Jalapeno Peppers
 - Pignolis

Filtered water to seal the dough. 


1.  Prepare the dough according to the attached instructions. 
2.  After the dough has risen, punch it down.  Place the half you are not using in a freezer bag, label and freeze for later use. 
3.  Roll the pizza dough out into a large rectangle-ish shape on a floured surface. 

4.  Liberally spread pesto over the surface of the dough - leaving about an inch of space at the top bare.

5.  Sprinkle the vegan cheese over the surface of the pesto, followed by the veggies and other toppings, as desired.

6.  Top with baby spinach.

7.  Slowly roll the pizza into a cigar shape.  Sprinkle a little water onto the top of the pizza to help the dough seal together. 

8.  Use a sharp non-serrated knife to slice the pizza into rounds.

9.  Place the pizza rounds onto an oiled sheet tray.  At this point, you can decide to place a towel over the prepared rolls, place in a warm place and allow them to rise some more, then bake them.  Or you can put them in the oven right away at 375 degrees for about 15-22 minutes - which is what I did.

10.  Let them cool just until you are able to handle them safely.  Dip into warm marinara sauce or whatever else you like to eat with your pizza.  Depending on my mood, I may drizzle some sriracha over the top.  Yum!


Enjoy!

Koko

Green Dinner: Gluten Free Pesto Pasta, Garlic Broccoli & Simple Green Salad

Finally went shopping.  Yay fresh veggies!  Hubby was helping me bring in the groceries and hung out with me while I was putting everything away.  He had insisted we purchase some beer and went to put it in the freezer  to chill it down quickly.  Imagine his surprise when he couldn't fit even one bottle in the freezer.  Oops!  I am a huge proponent of not throwing things away, so when I make a big batch of soup of a big batch of some other kind of meal, I don't like to throw any of it away, so I put it in a deli container, label it and freeze it.  It makes for some really easy, quick meals down the road too.  So he asked me to try to use up a couple things so his cervezas could chill.  Out came the last couple packages of pesto I made with the basil from our garden last summer.  It turned out great, because then I knew exactly what I was making for dinner.  Yummy pesto pasta!  I have been craving broccoli for a while so I decided to make that and a super simple green salad.  It was a nice tasty meal, not too heavy, and Hubbs was happy about his nice, cold cervezas!

 

 

 

Tasty GF Pesto Pasta and Fresh Veggies!

 

 

 

 

Serves: 2, with a little extra for leftovers

 

 

8 oz. desired pasta - I used Trader Joe's GF Brown Rice Penne Pasta

 

Pesto:

 

Yields: 2 1/2 cups (use what you need and freeze the rest)

 

1 1/2 cups toasted walnuts
3/4 cup olive oil
2-3 cloves garlic, chopped
2 tablespoons white miso
1 teaspoon sea salt
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
8 oz. basil, rinsed and spun very well

Extra Virgin Olive Oil, for drizzling

 

Garlic Broccoli

1 bunch broccoli, separated into florets, stems peeled and diced

1 tablespoon olive oil

4 cloves garlic, chopped

sea salt and black pepper to taste

 

1.  Prepare the pesto sauce.   Toast the walnuts and allow to cool.  Place in the bowl of a food processor along with the following: olive oil, garlic, miso, sea salt and black pepper.  Blend until relatively smooth.  Add in the basil and blend until combined, scraping down the sides of the bowl several times.  Set aside until ready to use.

2.  Prepare the pasta.  Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil.  Cook the pasta according to package directions.  Drain the pasta, but keep the water in the pot.

3.  Briefly blanch the broccoli until it is tender-crisp. 

4.  Saute the garlic in the olive oil until crispy.  Toss with the cooked broccoli.  Add sea salt and black pepper to taste.  Mix well. 

5.  Toss desired amount of pesto with the pasta.  Drizzle with a small amount of olive oil.  Serve with the broccoli and a simple green salad.

 

 

Enjoy!

 

Koko

 

Breaded Seitan Cutlets from the Vegan Diner Cookbook

I have this crazy thought that I will make most of the recipes out of the hundreds of vegan/vegetarian cookbooks I have.  I'll be honest, there are several recipes out of each cookbook that I would likely never make, simply because I do not like some of the ingredients, but lots of them look good and really make me want to make them.  That is the point of having a cookbook, right?

 

A couple years ago I purchased a cookbook called the Vegan Diner Cookbook.  All the pictures look great and I loved the theme.  Upon further investigation of the book, once it was delivered, I realized it had tons (and I mean tons!) of typos.  Really ridiculous ones too, like turn to this page for this sub-recipe, and the page it says is 000, as if they were going to go back and add it in once the book was completed, and just forgot.  Plus, I have been cooking for so many years that most of the time I am able to look at a recipe and realize if it will or will not work.  And there are quite a few in there that make no sense.  This really in-depth exploration of the book came after making several recipes, thinking that the recipe itself didn't make a lot of sense, then trying it and having it fail.  I cannot recommend this book for purchase, and after making several things from it that did not work, I put it on the shelf and haven't opened it in years.  But, like all meals that I cook, I took pictures of it (these are pics from Brooklyn) and felt I should post it.  So here are the breaded seitan cutlets from the book.  

Breaded Cutlets - baked and topped with melty vegan cheese

Spaghetti with Homemade Marinara and the Breaded Cutlet.

Koko