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The Kitchen Recessionista

So, here we are, in a recession. Let's eat!

New Recipe: Veggie Dog Pizza.

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A few weeks ago – Super Bowl weekend, actually – I knew I wanted to make some pizza for the big game, and in these budgetary times was trying to do so on the cheap(er). I knew I had some refrigerated dough left over from a recent two-pack purchase, so all good there, and had a bag of Violife mozzarella waiting to be used, along with some capers (LeeLee adores capers). I did need a new jar of pizza sauce, which was easily remedied, and then came the issue of toppings. A quick scan of the freezer showed that – lo! – I had two sausages left over from an earlier recipe, tucked into a translucent silicon storage bag and frozen solid.

The Saturday before the game, I moved said storage bag from the freezer to the fridge to defrost and thought nothing of it. On Sunday evening, however, as I brought the bag out of the fridge to slice and dice my sausage for our pizza, I realized that the contents felt … smaller than usual. Certainly not the regular Tofurky Italian I usually bought for various recipes. Perhaps it was Field Roast, which is a bit smaller, I thought to myself. Then I opened the bag and howled with laughter.

My friends, these were not sausages at all, but hot dogs. Veggie dogs. Two little links of veggie dogs, sitting there looking up at me from the silicon bag, all three of us wondering what the heck to do next.

My first stop was to show LeeLee, who also laughed uproariously, and then issued his opinion: “Do it!”

I agreed that this would make a wonderful experiment in pizza-making. Why hadn’t I thought of it before? And so I sliced the veggie dogs into coins, as I would have with the sausage, and placed them atop my prepared pizza – well, atop just half, decorating the other half with capers instead, just in case the experiment was a flop.

Into the oven it went for its usual 15 minutes, and then out it came, looking for all the world like the hot-dog pizza it was. After taking some photos and sending them to my dear friend Erin, a pizza aficionado and also no stranger to wild and crazy kitchen experiments, I sliced it up and we dug in.

The verdict: Success! The veggie dog topping tasted great, almost like a cross between pepperoni and sausage, and it fit in perfectly with the rest of the pizza’s flavor components. (The caper slices, naturally, were a winner as well, but we knew that already.) If I’d had time to think about it before my surprise veggie dogs revealed themselves, I might have added a bit of a Coney-dog flair to the pie, but not to worry – that’s on the docket for next time.

What pizza experiments have panned out (or not!) for you? Let’s hear about it in the comments!

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Veggie Dog Pizza

The veggie dog topping tastes great, almost like a cross between pepperoni and sausage, and it fits in perfectly with the rest of the pizza’s flavor components. Try it in your kitchen tonight!

  • Author: KitchenRecessionista
  • Prep Time: 10 minutes
  • Cook Time: 25 minutes
  • Total Time: 35 minutes
  • Yield: 4–8 servings 1x
Scale

Ingredients

1 pizza dough, store-bought or homemade

1 jar pizza sauce

1 bag of shredded mozzarella (we like Violife)

2–4 veggie dogs, sliced into coins

Instructions

Preheat oven to 450 degrees.

Prepare your dough per package or recipe instructions and bake for 12 minutes.

Take the dough back out of the oven and top with pizza sauce to taste, shredded mozzarella and as many veggie dog slices as you can stand.

Bake at 450 for 12-15 minutes or until crust is golden brown.

Vegetarian Travel Guide: Bozzelli’s Deli, Arlington, Va.

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Bozzelli’s Deli, 2600 Crystal Drive
Hours: 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Monday-Saturday; 11 a.m.-8 p.m. Sunday.
Menu: https://www.bozzellideli.com/crystal-city
Suited for: Vegetarians, vegans, omnivores, pizza fans

Ah, pizza. Just the thought of it sets my mouth to watering. And, even if I order a pie for just me, the thought of pizza gives me a feeling of community that I suppose first took root when I was a small child, visiting our beloved Barnaby’s restaurant in Tallahassee, Florida, and enjoying their square slices year after year! 

Delivery pizza also entered the lexicon for our family as I grew up in the 1980s, and before too long allegiances were formed (we were a Hungry Howie’s family in the ’90s). For football games, birthday parties, or lazy Friday nights at home, pizza was just a phone call away.

In this age of baking my own pizza crust and trying to eat a bit healthier, ordering pizza hasn’t been as regular of an occurrence as it used to be for me. But recently, I stumbled on Bozzelli’s, and it has quickly become a siren song. LeeLee out of town? Order a 10-inch Bozzelli’s pizza. LeeLee IN town? Order TWO 10-inch pies. Movie night? Order a Bozzelli’s pie. And so on, and so forth. It’s become a bit of a habit, to be honest.

And, pray tell, why not? From all the standard pizzas to ones stationed further afield, you could order from Bozzelli’s twice a week and still not come up with an identical combination for a long, long time.

I first learned of Bozzelli’s during Veganuary this year, and right away it became my go-to choice for vegan pizza. Gone are the days of pizzerias veganizing your order by simply removing the cheese and throwing on a bunch of vegetables. Oh, no. Want a good old-fashioned pepperoni pizza? They have a vegan version. How about vegan ground beef? Vegan sausage? They’ve got those too. Chik’n parm pizza? Yes, that too. Looking for a pie teeming with fresh veggies? The Farm Girl has your back.

My personal favorite go-to order is the Vegan Joe From Jersey, which begins with marinara sauce and is topped with mozzarella, sausage, mushrooms and onions. I could eat it again and again (and have!). Pro tip: Order more than you plan on eating for dinner – it keeps beautifully and makes a great lunch a day or two later.

And there is a “deli” side to Bozzelli’s Deli, as well, filled with such fun options as a vegan meatball sub, a chik’n parm sub, chik’n nuggets and more. Everything holds up well if you choose delivery (which we generally do), so don’t fret.

Alongside the vegan options, vegetarian guests will also find plenty to enjoy. From white pizzas to margheritas to a veggie-heavy variety, there’s a wealth of options without venturing into vegan-cheese territory.

Bozzelli’s is becoming a bit of a pizza empire in the D.C. metro area: With three locations in Virginia and two in the District proper, its reach is fairly expansive. And with a menu like theirs, it’s a well-deserved growth trajectory!

:)

Vegetarian Travel Guide: The Moose’s Tooth, Anchorage, Alaska

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THE MOOSE’S TOOTH
3300 Old Seward Highway, Anchorage, Alaska
Hours: 10:30 a.m.-midnight Monday-Friday; 11 a.m.-midnight Saturday-Sunday
Menu: http://moosestooth.net/menu/
Suitable for: Vegetarians, omnivores

Stay in Anchorage for even just a little while and you’re sure to hear about the Moose’s Tooth, located in “Midtown” (which, to the uninitiated, doesn’t seem like the middle of town in practice). And for good reason: The Moose’s Tooth is one of the most popular restaurants in town, serving up pizzas of all stripes and a bucketful of great craft-brewed beer to boot.

Expect a wait when you arrive, no matter the time of day. It’s popular for a reason: The pizzas are worth the wait – which, incidentally, can range from a few minutes to well more than an hour depending on the day and your party size! But stick it out – maybe enjoy a beer in the interim, or just enjoy the weather outside (provided it’s not the dead of winter!) – and your buzzer will go off in no time.

One of the best parts of the Moose’s Tooth’s menu is that all the meatless pizzas are aggregated together in the Vegetable section, making it easy to parse the different selections. But don’t expect your decision to be simple: There are a plethora of great veggie choices!

The Wild Mushroom is one I go back to again and again. Loaded with portabellas and criminis, plus sundried tomatoes, provolone, mozzarella, goat cheese, and the restaurant’s famous Denali Sauce, it’s a hearty pizza that appeals to mushroom lovers far and wide.

If mushrooms aren’t your thing and you’re looking for some bling (see what I did there?), you could do much worse than The Backpacker, which combines spinach, roasted garlic cloves (which turn just a little bit sweet after roasting), artichoke hearts, sundried tomatoes, and Kalamata olives with mozzarella, provolone, and feta cheese. Topped with just a hint of garlic oil, it’s a wonderfully fresh pizza that combines the tang of olives and artichokes with the smooth garlic cloves and zesty spinach.

It would be a crime to leave the Moose’s Tooth without sampling some of the beers brewed by the restaurant’s sister brewery, Broken Tooth Brewing. Along with a rotating cast of characters – try the Midtown Brown if you can catch it – there’s also a wonderful group of Old Faithfuls that are hallmarks of the brewery. One such choice is the Moonflower ESB, a smooth, barely-bitter selection that has a citrus undertone. Or go with the Fairweather IPA for a bolder, hoppier option – the gold-colored drink offers up a bit of spice to go along with what you’d expect in a good IPA.

Far-flung though it is, if you’re venturing up to Anchorage, you’d be remiss not to visit the Moose’s Tooth while you’re in town. There’s always room for pizza and beer, during sunny summers or dark winters!

:)

Vegan Pepperoni Pizzadillas.

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vegan-pepperoni-pizzadillas

So, we’ve had rain for 13 straight days – a record if you listen to the local weather guys, and sometimes I do. I actually really like the rain, love snuggling in bed and sleeping in when I hear the drops on the metal roof. I appreciate these rainy days that water my peppers so I don’t have to lift a finger. And I love using my rain gauge and watching the total tick up, up, up.

That said, 13 days in a row of rain in some form or fashion is a bit much if you ask me. I knew today’s record called for a celebration of sorts, and just felt so clear in my heart that vegan pepperoni pizzadillas were just the ticket!

I’ve written about these pizzadillas before, and I’ve got to tell you, they’re a family favorite around here. What’s more, they make copious leftovers – three additional pizzadillas out of a package of tortillas! What’s not to love?

Along with the pizzadillas this time around, we also enjoyed a salad that I quickly christened our Jumbo Special. Sporting larger-than-life cherry tomatoes from Twin Springs Fruit Farm and colossal black olives that LeeLee chose at the grocery store, it certainly lived up to its name. To wit:

jumbo-salad

At any rate, we mowed down the salad and pizzadillas with record speed and are reveling in the fact that we’ve got quite a few more to get through over the next week. Let’s hear it for another rainy day!

:)

Vegetarian “Beef” Pizza With Salad.

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veggie-pizza

Well, here we are, back in the post-holiday workweek. My first day back in the office in 2016 was compounded by an afternoon visit to the dentist – who, in fairness, proclaimed my teeth to be in good shape. I’ll take it!

I had neglected to visit the grocery store over the weekend, so on my way home from the dentist today I stopped in and picked up some supplies, both for tonight and the next couple of evenings as well. We’ll have a Crock-Pot creation in short order, but in the meantime, tonight had to be a quick-fix situation because of a meeting LeeLee was to attend later in the evening.

Y’all know I enjoy making my own pizza dough and such, but tonight I let the Pillsbury Doughboy do the work and simply topped the crust with sauce, cheese, two diced veggie burgers and some sliced mushrooms. Opened a ready-made salad from a bag and shazam! We were ready to eat.

I’m telling you what, our leftover situation is growing quite nicely! We’ve still got a bit of black-eyed peas and collards left from New Year’s, as well as plenty of veggie dogs from last night. And now we’ve got several slices of pizza left over as well, which will make for a wonderful midweek lunch! I’ll take it.

:)

Vegetarian “Beef” Pizza With Salad.

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veg-beef-pizza

Friends, I apologize for my radio silence over the past few days! The holiday season is moving fast and furiously now, and the watchword of this month has been Flexibility. We’ve had lots of parties to attend (and host), lots of fun traditions to uphold – to say nothing of our day jobs, which continue apace! The combination has left me very little time to blog, and I do apologize for that.

I knew tonight was going to be a laid-back evening, so last night I put together a batch of pizza dough for just such an occasion. When LeeLee called to say he was on his way home from the office, I flattened the dough into a pizza pan and baked it for about 12 minutes, then topped it with sauce, mozzarella cheese, chopped veggie burgers, and sliced mushrooms. I baked the pizza for another 14 minutes, let it rest for a minute or two after the fact, and then sliced it up!

In the meantime, we tossed a premixed salad teeming with kale, Brussels sprouts, cabbage, and more; the combination of the fresh greens with the hearty pizza made a wonderfully complementary dish!

LeeLee and I have been packing meals away with a little more gusto than usual of late – tis the season and whatnot – so tonight we each only had a couple of slices of pizza, leaving us plenty for lunch tomorrow. Which works out really nicely, because for all the Christmas planning I’ve been doing, I didn’t have a thing worked out for our lunch! Pizza to the rescue – as always.

:)

Sunday Cookout: Grilled Vegetable Calzones.

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grilled-calzone

Tonight, we tried something we’d always wanted to attempt on the backyard grill: Calzones!

Grilled pizzas are, of course, a summertime mainstay for us here at Chez Recessionista. Generally, we go for the personal-pie size since it’s easier to handle on the grill. And no matter the size, the heat of the coals crisps the dough up like nothing else, giving us a makeshift wood-fired oven right in the back yard!

I’ve always wanted to give other pizza-like concoctions a try over the charcoal, and tonight, I decided to take the plunge. So I whipped up a batch of my usual pizza dough and got straight to work.

First, I heated up the grill as per usual (which is to say, as hot as it’ll go – we only know one temperature here in the Recessionista Back Yard), and prepared my calzones as the fire died down. I decided to make two chunky calzones rather than one uber one or several smaller ones, reasoning that the size of these would give me some wiggle room (i.e. room for error). This resulted in some touch-and-go plate-to-grill-to-plate transitions later, but largely worked out OK.

At any rate, I flattened the dough out as thinly as I could manage and then painted a strip of pizza sauce on the lower portion of the crust. Then I added in several hearty dollops of a ricotta mixture I’d whipped up on a whim – a medium-sized container of ricotta cheese, about a cup of frozen kale I’d preserved from this spring, and a can of sliced mushrooms, mixed together with salt and pepper.

Now, this is the first point in the process when things got dicey. On the first calzone, I made a rookie mistake and put the sauce and cheese too close to the edge, which meant I had a hard time getting a good seal. So I gingerly pushed everything up the dough a bit (leaving a wake of sauce, but who cares) and then pulled the top of the dough over the bottom and crimped the whole thing shut with a fork.

On the second calzone, I learned a thing or two from the first try and compiled it largely without incident.

Once the coals were charred and the grate was piping-hot, it was time to transfer the calzones over to the grill. This required me to remove my glasses and make two failed attempts and picking the calzones up off the pizza pan, then request LeeLee’s help and then think better of it (because if I managed to drop one as he stood there holding the pan, he’d never hear the end of it – that’s a burden best carried out by myself!), then pull a wooden chair over, place the pizza pan on it as a steadying table, and then take said pan back off the chair, whisk the spatula under the calzone, and before I had time to shout “Faccia Bella!” transfer each calzone to the grill without incident.

calzones-on-grill

Whew.

The cooking process doesn’t take but a few minutes – 10 minutes, tops, on the first side, and then about 5-7 minutes on the second side. And I’ll have you know that the flipping motion wasn’t difficult at all to do once the dough had firmed up with the heat! There was one last panic when taking the calzones off the grill at the end, but this time LeeLee stood resolutely by holding the pizza pan and all went according to plan.

Then, it was time to eat.

Ooh, whee! Why haven’t we been doing this for ages? These calzones were some of the best I’ve ever made at home, and that’s in large part due to the cooking method. They never crisp up enough in the oven, no matter what I do, but on the grill they were perfectly brown and crispy on the outside while still being soft and bubbly and piping-hot on the inside. Success!

The calzones were so large that we only split one and ate it, safe in the knowledge that we needn’t fight over the other one tomorrow for lunch; we’ll just split it again and call it a day. I can hardly wait!

:)

Burger-and-Mushroom Pizza.

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burger-and-mushroom-pizza

LeeLee and I missed one another for dinner tonight – he had a nighttime meeting and I worked a little later than usual, so I ended up dining alone. But never fear! I was not subsisting on crumbs here at Chez Recessionista. No, instead I feasted on homemade pizza.

Well, technically, not every component of tonight’s meal was homemade. I cheated a bit and bought a roll-out pizza crust from the store because I didn’t want to fool with waiting an hour for handmade dough to rise tonight. But it’s still homemade in my heart!

First, I heated up two veggie burgers and then chopped them up. As they cooled off, I warmed up the dough on a pizza pan in the oven for about 8 minutes and then topped it with pizza sauce, slices of mozzarella cheese, the burger crumbles, and some sliced mushrooms. Then I baked the pie for another 14-or-so minutes, rotating the pan once to ensure the crust browned evenly. And then I pulled it out of the oven triumphantly, cut it into eight slices, and feasted! (Not on all eight slices, mind you.)

I’ve got plenty left over for lunch tomorrow (or a late-night dinner for LeeLee tonight if he comes home hungry!), which is always a bonus! And only one pizza pan to clean up. Life is good!

:)

Vegan French Bread Pizzas.

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vegan-french-bread-pizza

What’s better on a Tuesday night than good ol’ pizza? Especially a French bread pizza that can be made in an instant, with minimal muss or fuss?

Tonight was a Women’s World Cup night, you see, and as I type this the U.S.-Germany game is at halftime, so I must be brief. Tonight’s meal prep also needed to be brief so I could get everything in order to watch the game, and French bread pizzas were just the ticket!

I’ve gone over this recipe before on the blog, but suffice it to say, I sliced a loaf of French bread in half crosswise, then did so again lengthwise so that there were four pizza crusts in the end. Then I spooned pizza sauce liberally atop each one and sprinkled Daiya mozzarella to coat. Then I added several Tofurky pepperoni slices as well as some sliced button mushrooms to the crusts, and then sprinkled just a touch more mozzarella on top just to keep the toppings in place. Then I baked the pizzas at 450 degrees for about 15 minutes, and voila!

As the pizzas baked, I tossed a quick salad (romaine, cherry tomatoes, fresh broccoli florets, leftover sliced mushrooms, and some mozzarella, just to name a few ingredients) and by the time the pizzas were done we were more than ready to eat! We washed our meals down with a beer – because it’s a World Cup night, so why not? And then we plunked down to watch the beginning of the game, which has been rather unruly thus far!

… and speaking of the game, it’s about to come back on. Gotta go! U.S.A.! U.S.A.!

:)

Sunday Cookout: Grilled Pizza.

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grilled-pizzas

It’s here! It’s here! Our first grilled pizza of the season!

I have to admit, I’ve been waiting for Grilled Pizza Day for about a month now. This particular cookout plan requires a little bit of advance work (making the dough ahead of time, preferably far enough ahead to refrigerate it for a few hours), as well as ready audience participation. So some nights, we were feeling a bit lazy and didn’t want to hand-make every morsel of food that we ate. And some other weekends, we were short on prep time. Tonight, the stars aligned, and we got right to work.

I made the dough before church this morning and let it rise during the hourlong service (thank heaven for the Episcopalians!), then put it in the fridge when we got home. Shortly before it was time to fire up the grill, I sliced and diced a red bell pepper and several vegan burger patties, washed some pre-sliced mushrooms, and got my black olives and pizza sauce in order. LeeLee, in the meantime, raided our herb garden and came back with some lovely basil, oregano, and parsley, which he chopped up with our kitchen scissors.

Then we made our pizzas in the usual way, which is to say, in all manner of styles. Some (mine) went heavy on the Daiya mozzarella; some (LeeLee’s) were veggie-meat-lovers’ specialties. In all, we made six mini-pizzas and mowed down four of them; the other two are hanging out in the fridge, primed for lunch tomorrow!

Welcome back, grilled pizza!! We have missed this meal so. Now, we’ll make up for lost time, all summer long!

:)