Summer Harvest Pizza
One summer in high school, my sister and I discovered the brilliance of white pizza with fresh summer veggies. The simple contrast of creamy sauce and peak of season vegetables is a dynamic combination. The local favorite at the farm-stand near our house featured sweetcorn and mozzarella. I had this summery veggie pizza in mind as I layered fresh August tomatoes, peppers, corn, and red cabbage on creamy basil studded ricotta and gooey mozzarella, topped with leaves of sweet basil. Heaven.
For another great vegetarian main, check out our grilled spelt flatbread with tapenade and tomatoes.
Yield: 1 medium pizza
Ingredients:
Pizza:
- 1 recipe flatbread dough (try our spelt flatbread)
- 1 cup fresh or frozen corn
- 1 green pepper, thinly sliced
- 1/4 cup red cabbage, thinly sliced
- 1/2 pint red and yellow cherry tomatoes, cut in half
- 1 cup mozzarella balls, cut in half
- 1/2 cup basil, finely chopped (for garnish)
White Sauce:
- 1/2 cup ricotta
- 1/2 cup sour cream
- 1 tablespoon flour
- 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
- 1/4 teaspoon ground pepper
- 1 tablespoon fresh basil
Steps:
- For the Pizza: Heat the oven to 450.
- For the White Sauce: In a blender or food processor, puree together the ricotta, sour cream, flour, salt, pepper and basil until smooth.
- On a floured surface use a rolling pin to roll out a rough circle, it should be about 1/4 inch thick. Lay the dough on a baking sheet with a parchment or a silicon baking mat to prevent sticking.
- To prepare the pizza, spread the white sauce on the dough leaving a 1/2 inch border around the edges. Evenly distribute the corn, pepper, red cabbage, tomatoes, and mozzarella over the top.
- Bake the pizza for 12-15 minutes until the crust is cooked through and the cheese melts. Top with fresh basil immediately prior to serving. Serve hot.
Portobello Burgers With Green Olive Tapenade
Portobello Burgers With Green Olive Tapenade are funky and slightly off the beaten veggie burger path with a briny sauce that will send your taste buds into cartwheels of happiness. All modesty aside, we are were feeling pretty chuffed with ourselves when we first bit into these burgers, creamy mozarella melts into smokey portobellos with a full meaty texture. Green olive tapenade brings a mysterious licorice and sea salty flavor, respectfully sandwiched between rolls liberally smeared by basil mayonnaise. High-fives and groans of delight were followed by a respectful 5 minutes of silent appreciation (read: scarfing) of these Portobello Burgers With Green Olive Tapenade.
Tomato, Feta, and Garden Herb Toasts
With the first tomatoes and herbs of the season coming in, it is time to celebrate summer! Nothing highlights fresh-from-the-vine juicy tomatoes and backyard herbs like like Tomato, Feta, and Garden Herb Toasts. Brushed in olive oil, the bread is grilled for a warm smokey base. Basil and feta tossed tomatoes provide a vibrant topping to the an herbed creme fraiche spread. Tomato, Feta, and Garden Herb Toasts taste like summer, and are quick and easy to put together. We used a goat cheese feta from our CSA, an exquisite local find! This dish works beautifully as both an appetizer or a main.
Grilled Spelt Flatbread with Tapenade & Tomato
Check out our Grilled Spelt Flatbread with Tapenade & Tomato featured in Pittsburgh Magazine this week! We just love Brazen Kitchen's Leah Lizarondo and her irreverent take on seasonal vegetarian cooking.
This tender and chewy flatbread uses local spelt to up the nutty whole grain flavor. We are addicted to this no-knead spelt flatbread, and find it has a taste and texture reminiscent of Indian naan and whole wheat pita. On a warm summers evening, we like to throw this easy flatbread on the grill, spread generously with briny tapenade, and top with juicy ripe tomatoes. This spunky tapenade, packed with garlic, tarragon, and green olives, pairs beautifully with the sweetness of August tomatoes. For us, this dish epitomizes summer: fresh produce, bright flavors, and smoky char.
Heirloom Tomato Bruschetta with Queso Fresco
Normally tomatoes and I aren't close. I am that annoying person who picks them out of my salad and fishes tomatoes out of my sandwich, it's an embarrassing trait. This tomato avoidance changes each summer with the arrival of beautiful, sweet, summer tomatoes. This week we got two colorful striped heirloom tomatoes from our CSA and my tomato appetite returned with a vengeance. Paul had just pulled a grainy loaf of sourdough bread out of the oven, our basil plants were looking lush and prime for the picking, and so decided on bruschetta for dinner. We gobbled up a platter for an al fresco summer dinner.
Bacon and Caramelized Onion Flatbread, Flammkuchen
It's moving day for us at The Hungry Hounds. Fueled by donuts, coffee and tons of moving help from family and friends, we are on our way from Pennsylvania to Indiana for our final goodbyes with Paul's family before we leave for Haiti. Cooking and eating in our kitchen for the past few weeks has been a bit of an awkward experience with many frustrated sighs and the frequent realization, '...oh right, we packed that already, didn't we!?' One of the last dishes we made when our kitchen was still in full swing was this tasty Flammkuchen, a comfort pizza-like-classic from the Alsatian and South German regions, with many variations and names. We modeled ours after the classic version, a thin crusted flatbread pizza with a creamy, slightly tangy sauce, smoky bacon, a smattering of cheese, and the succulent sweetness of caramelized onions.
