Leftover Lovers Pizza

When you're cooking for two, chances are you'll get to the end of the week and have a few leftover items - be it veggies, cheese, or proteins - that won't make it past the weekend. You could just throw them away, but if you're anything like me, you hate to waste! Well luckily I live with a pizza-holic who could eat the stuff for breakfast, lunch, and dinner everyday of the week. So I came up with Leftover Lovers pizza - an almost weekly ritual that helps me use up whatever's in my fridge!

You can start with a store bought crust or a homemade version. My personal favorite is a recipe from Bon Appetit. It's thin, crisp, and absolutely perfect. Here's how it's done ...

In a large bowl, combine 2 tsp sugar with 3/4 cup water and 1.5 tsp active dry yeast. Stir it up, it will look like this:

Let it sit around for about 5 minutes until it looks spongy. Something like this ...

Now stir in 1.5 Tbsp olive oil, 1 tsp salt, and 2 1/4 cups flour. Knead it up for about 5 minutes. You'll find it therapeutic ...

Now take the dough out and coat the bowl with a dab of olive oil. Add your dough ball back into the bowl, cover it with a towel, and leave it alone for about 1.5 hours. It should go from this:

To this:

Now you'll want to turn your oven to very hot (500 degrees) and put your pizza stone or pans in the oven. This is key because the hot pan will help crisp up the dough when you put it on. While the pans are warming, stretch your dough out with hand, a rolling pin, sheer will, whatever works! I like to make mine into two long flatbreads, but you can do two traditional circles or even squares. Here's mine:

Now toss that towel back on top of your dough, and let it rest for another 15 minutes while you drink a little pre-pizza beer and get your toppings out of the fridge and chopped up. After your crust rests, take the hot pans carefully out of the oven and put the crust on them. You'll hear them start to crisp up a bit on the bottoms. It's lovely!

Now you're ready to top it off. For these two pizzas I did:

Pizza #1 which was out of this world

1 cup Manchego cheese
About 1/3 link of crumbled chorizo
Around 10 large shrimp chopped up

Pizza #2 which was decent but paled in comparison to its oven-brethren

Smear of olive oil on the crust
About 6 blanched green onions
A couple of slices of shredded Prosciutto
1 cup grated Mozzarella
1/3 cup grated Parmesan

Now bake these in your 500 degree oven for 10 minutes, slice 'em up and enjoy! The beauty of these pizzas is you can really top them with whatever you like. I'll keep you updated on what combinations I successfully come up with in the future!

Enjoy!

Cherry swirl cake

Awhile back, I picked up a cookbook called 101 Things to do with a Cake Mix at a thrift store for about cents. It's a cute little book and all the recipes are effortless - involving cake mix and just a few other ingredients. When I was craving something sweet the other day, I thought I'd whip up one of these simple recipes and was delighted with the result! It took almost no time to make and was just as quickly gobbled up.

Enjoy!

Cherry Swirl Cake
from 101 Things to do with a Cake Mix

Ingredients:
1 white cake mix
3 eggs
2 cans or 21 ounces cherry pie filling
Whipped cream or powdered sugar

Directions:
1. Prehat oven to 350 degrees
2. Mix cake mix and eggs together and stir in half of the cherry pie filling
3. Pour batter into a greased bundt cake pan and bake 40-50 minutes or until an inserted toothpick comes out clean
4. Invert hot cake onto a platter and dust with powdered sugar
5. Serve with reserved pie filling and whipped topping

Marsala mushroom pizza

One of my favorite veggies out there are mushrooms - when cooked, mushrooms take on the flavor of whatever they are mixed with, making them delicious little morsels that can serve as a "meaty" substitute in a vegetarian meal.

So when I had some leftover Marsala wine from a chicken dinner, mushrooms were the clear ingredient to soak up some great Marsala taste. And thus this mushroom marsala pizza was born! Delicious, filling, and bursting with mushrooms, it was a great weeknight meal!

Mushroom Marsala Pizza

Ingredients:

One, 12 inch thin pizza crust (I created this mine from this recipe using half whole-wheat flour)

20 ounces mixed mushrooms (I used cremini, baby portobello, and portobello)
1 cup Marsala wine
3 TB butter
3 TB heavy cream
Pinch of fresh herbs (I used sage but thyme or rosemary would also work well)
1 cup Parmesan cheese
2 cups mozzarella cheese (you could use a variety of cheeses you have on hand: asiago, fontina, etc)

Steps:

Preheat oven to 475 degrees.

1. Heat a large pan over medium-high heat than add in the mushrooms - this will look too many mushrooms at first but they cook down.

2. Continue to cook and stir the mushrooms as they release their moisture (it will look like water is filling the pan) and stir to thoroughly coat them in their own juice.

3. When most of the liquid has boiled away, add a pinch of salt, butter, and fresh herbs. Cook for about 3-4 minutes or until nicely sauteed and browned.

4. Add Marsala wine to the pan and increase the heat to high. Boil until most of the Marsala has evaporated.

5. In the last minute, add in the cream and stir well until coated.

6. On your rolled-out pizza crust, pour out the mushrooms and any remaining sauce and spread around until evenly coated. Top with the cheese.

7. Bake either on a pizza stone or baking sheet for 10-12 minutes or until cheese is bubbly and brown. Bon appetit!

Black cow cupcakes

Growing up, on special TV watching nights in our house, my mom, dad, sister and I would curl up in our pajamas on the couch, skip dinner, and instead have black cows (aka root beer floats) and popcorn. It was my very favorite thing - no vegetables, no table, and TV! How good does it get?!

So with the Oscars approaching last Sunday, I knew I wanted to serve up something special for a TV night-in, and to give my old favorite a little kick, I transformed black cows and popcorn into a cupcake! Complete with popcorn bucket!

They were delicious, fun, and the perfect mix of salty and sweet. Here's how I did it.

Black Cow Cupcakes
Adapted from Baked Perfection
Makes 24 cupcakes

Ingredients:

2 cups root beer
1 cup dark unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter
1 1/4 cups granulated sugar
1/2 cup firmly packed dark brown sugar
2 cups all purpose flour
1 1/4 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
2 large eggs

whipped cream or ice cream
popcorn (I used a sea salt variety)

1.Preheat the oven to 350F and line a cupcake pan with cupcake liners (this will prevent the moisture of the cake from leaking onto your "bucket")

2. In a small saucepan, heat the root beer, cocoa powder, and butter over medium heat until the butter is melted. Add the sugars and whisk until dissolved. Remove from heat and let cool.

3.In a large bowl, whisk the flour, baking soda, and salt together.

4. Whisk eggs into the cooled cocoa mixture until combined. Gently fold the flour mixture and cocoa mixture together. The batter will be slightly lumpy.

5. Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake for 30-35 minutes or until a fork inserted in the middle of a cake comes out clean.

6. Once the cupcakes are cool, wrap each in a popcorn "bucket."*

7. Add a dollop of ice cream or whipped cream to the top of each cake, inside the bucket.

8. Sprinkle popcorn on top so it looks like the whole bucket is full and enjoy!

* I created my buckets in inDesign, printed them, then used a scalloped edge scissor to cut them out. I then wrapped each cake in one and secured it at the back with tape so it could be easily unwrapped and eaten. Let me know if you would like this and I'll send you the PDF!

Whoop it up

One of the drawbacks of working from home is that you never leave the "office" and since I use the same computer for work and non-work activities, I usually shut down my office inbox right when my day ends. Lately, however, my pesky little computer has decided I'm not working long enough, and continues to pop-up Outlook inbox alerts, even when my inbox is shut-down.

After all the pretty images I search for on you, Computer? This is the thanks I get?

Anyways, one of these out-of-place alerts decided to interrupt me with some really non-fun emails last night as I used him to copy the marinade on this recipe. Guess he didn't feel like chicken tonight.

So what did I do? A little of this you ask...?

No, no. I'm a peace-keeping individual. Instead, I just poured myself a tall glass of wine and proceeded to make and eat myself some whoopie pies. And Computer? He went to bed hungry. Boo-ya!

Coconut Cream Whoopie Pies

Adapted from Dolcetto Confections
Makes about a baker's dozen

Ingredients:
Whoopie Pies:
1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 tablespoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon table salt
1 stick unsalted butter, softened
1 cup granulated
1 egg
1 cup low-fat buttermilk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Filling:
I was rushed so I confess to using a can of vanilla cake frosting (holds crossed fingers in front of self). Don't hate me. But you could use any basic frosting recipe.

Topping:
1/3 cup coconut

Instructions:
1. Preheat oven to 400°F and grease two baking sheets.
2. Mix together dry ingredients and set aside.
3. In a separate bowl, beat butter and sugar on medium speed until light and fluffy. Add eggs, buttermilk, and vanilla and beat until combined. Gradually add flour mixture and beat on low speed until combined.
4. Drop generous amounts of batter (a very overfilled spoon will do) onto prepared baking sheets, 1-2 inches apart or use a whoopie pie pan.
5. Bake about 8 minutes or until risen and springy.
6. Remove from baking sheets and let cool.
7. Meanwhile, heat a small pan over medium heat and toss in coconut. Toast for about 5 minutes, tossing continuously until slightly browned on the edges.
8. When pies are cooled, divide into sets of two and generously frost one pie and add a pinch of toasted coconut.
9. Top the pie with its other half and squeeze gently so the frosting rims the edges.
10. Roll the pie edges in the toasted coconut until covered.
11. Serve with a glass of white wine, cozied up on your couch.

Cherry walnut salad

While we were on vacation, we ate out our lunches way more frequently than we do at home and ended up at Panera (or St. Louis Bread Company as called in STL) quite a few times. I've loved Panera since high school but was so pleased with their new Harvest Chicken Salad - I had to try my own version at home! Not only did I get to try out two of my Christmas gifts (a Food Network food processor and Williams Sonoma vinaigrette shaker), it turned out so yummy, I think I'm going to try to reinvent a few more of my dining-out faves!

I hope you try it and love it as much as me!

Cherry walnut salad (Panera's Harvest Chicken)
Ingredients:
I made for two, but you can totally adjust the below by taste or number of eaters
- Mixed greens or other lettuce
- Pear (1)
- Handful of dried cherries
- Toasted walnuts - about 1/2 cup
- Crumbled blue cheese - about 1/2 cup
- Grilled chicken breast (1)

1. Toss ingredients together and serve with the vinaigrette below.


Cherry Vinaigrette:
From Derek's mom, Chris. Makes one cup - more than enough for a salad for two.


-1/3 cup dried cherries
- 1/4 cup hot water
- 1 cloves garlic
- 1/8 cup balsamic vinegar
- 1/2 cup extra-virgin olive oil
- 1/2 tablespoon Dijon mustard
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 1/4 teaspoon ground white pepper

1. Soak cherries in hot water for 15 minutes; pour cherries and liquid into blender or food processor. Add garlic, vinegar and half of olive oil. Process until garlic is finely chopped.
2. Add mustard, salt and pepper, blending after each addition.
3. With blender running, add remaining olive oil in a steady stream.
4. Serve with salad and save the rest in an airtight container for only a couple of days.

Eggnog cheesecake bars

I had some leftover eggnog after this yummy recipe, and with just one day to go until Derek and I headed out of town, I thought it would be good to use it up while making something yummy to bring my family for the holidays.

I couldn't find any eggnog recipes that were really striking my fancy, so I decided to invent my own! Hence, eggnog cheesecake bars were born, adapted from this recipe for pumpkin bars.


These turned out very yummy and rich! Let me know if you try them out.

Eggnog cheesecake bars

Base/Topping:
1 package Snickerdoodle cookie mix (I used Krustaez)
1 cup walnuts
1/2 cup cold butter - sliced

Filling:
1/2 cup eggnog
2 (8 oz) packages cream cheese
1 cup sugar
1/3 cup flour
1 tsp pumpkin pie spice (or cinnamon would work)
1.5 tsp rum extract
2 TB whipping cream
2 eggs

Directions:
1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. In a large bowl, combine the snickerdoodle mix (and cinnamon sugar if it came with it) and walnuts.
2. A few slices at a time, add in the butter, mixing into a crumbly, sticky mix either with your (very clean!) hands or a food processor.
3. Set aside one cup of the mixture, and press the remaining base into the bottom of a 9 x 13 inch brownie pan.
4. Bake for 10 minutes then let cool for at least 10 minutes.
5. While the base is baking, beat the cream cheese and sugar together until smooth.
6. Add in all the other ingredients and beat until combined.
7. Pour the filling on top of the base and smooth out.
8. Top with the remaining cup of the base.
9. Bake for 40 - 45 minutes or until top is light brown.
10. Chill/harden for at least 2 hours in the fridge.
11. Dive-in!

Eggnog French Toast with Rum Syrup

Every Sunday, Derek treats me to a late sleep-in and some relaxation while he fixes us a special breakfast and does all the laundry. Even though I love to cook, it's nice to have a day off and the special care he takes of me is super sweet.

This Sunday, however, we planned to put our routine on hold since I had an early morning flight to NYC for a few days of work and visiting some friends. So when my flight was cancelled due to the winter white-out in the Midwest, I decided to take advantage of the already off-beat day to try out a recipe that had been brewing in my holiday-crazy mind for a few weeks now.

The result was glorious, so much so that Derek didn't even mind I stole his position as Sunday head-chef (though I still let him do the laundry). Enjoy!


Eggnog French Toast with Rum Syrup
Makes 12 pieces

Ingredients:

Toast-
12 slices cinnamon bread
2 eggs
1.5 cups eggnog (we used "vanilla spice" instead of regular - highly recommend)
1 tsp pumpkin pie spice (or use a combo of nutmeg and cinnamon if you don't have this)

Syrup-
1/4 cup butter
1/4 cup milk
1 cup powdered (confectioner's) sugar
1 teaspoon rum extract

Directions:

1. Heat a large pan over medium.
2. Crack the eggs into a bowl and whisk with a fork until well-beaten.
3. Add the eggnog and pumpkin pie spice to the eggs and mix until thoroughly combined.
4. One at a time, dip each slice of bread into the eggnog mixture and turn with a fork to coat both sides.
5. Transfer slices to the pan and cook on each side until slightly browned - flipping once.
   * Since my pan fits only about 3-4 slices at a time, I keep the finished pieces of toast on a plate in the oven on "Warm" so they don't get cold.

6. Meanwhile, put the butter and milk in a saucepan on medium-low heat and heat, stirring occasionally, until melted.
7. Add in the powered sugar and rum extract and continue to stir until combined.
8. Keep the syrup on "low," stirring occasionally, until you've made all the toast.
9. Plate the toast and drizzle generously with syrup.
10. Stuff yourself until it hurts!

Quite a pear

My favorite dinner I've made lately was the Pear and Brie Quesadilla I found here, which I served with a salad and salmon in a white wine sauce. The sweet, sticky quesadilla was quite tasty especially on the chilly, drizzly nights we've been having in San Diego this week.



I've never cooked with pear before, but this recipe has me looking for more. I've pear-ed it down to two sweet and two savory recipes I can't wait to try.


Pear Crisps with Vanilla Brown Butter from Smitten Kitchen look like heaven on a cool night.



The praline topping on this pear spice cake from Joy the Baker looks deadly good.



Martha Stewart's recipes are always so gorgeous. I love this Pear and Sausage Pie.



A grilled cheese sandwich with bacon and pear would be an awesome flavor combination from Simply Recipes.