Hello everyone! I would like you to meet my guest blogger, Kathleen Trace. She is a full time high school teacher, mom, photographer, blogger, and so much more! She also believes in a healthy lifestyle and is helping her family develop healthy eating habits as well as an active lifestyle. Kathleen and I met several years ago when we both had the privilege to be a part of the Japan Fulbright Scholarship program. We spent a little over 3 weeks in Japan together where we became fast and good friends! Although our friendship is mostly virtual now, we still stay in touch constantly.
One quick story before you read her post: While Kathleen and I were visiting our prefecture in rural, northern Japan, we spent many evenings walking to the grocery store, gazing over all the amazing food, buying new and different foods with labels we couldn’t read, and walking back to our hotel to sit on our hotel floor and enjoy our meal (very acceptable to do in Japan). However, one night, I bought what I thought was yogurt, and got back to the hotel only to realize it was butter!
The whole thing was a learning experience we both cherished, and now we continue to support each other as teachers, friends, moms, and bloggers! I know you will enjoy her post!
If you are a fan of this blog, as I am, you are also probably a fan of healthy cooking and eating. The struggle for me is having the time to prepare healthy meals for my family every day of the week while also working full time as a high school teacher.
I want to share one of my easy, go-to, healthy weeknight meals…PIZZA! You might not think of pizza as healthy, but just wait. With my super easy, no knead homemade crust, and lots of veggies, pizza night can become one of the healthiest nights of the week.
The only forethought it requires is prepping the dough the night before. One tip, though, is to prep enough dough for a month worth of pizzas and store it in the freezer. Then you can just take out one the morning of before you leave for work. It freezes really well wrapped tightly in plastic wrap (or in a bread bag).
Here’s the deal. I’ve timed myself. You can make this pizza dough in less than five minutes (I’ve done it in three).
Dough Ingredients (let me preface by saying the only thing I measure is the flour. I eyeball the rest, but I’ll give you measurements to get you started. You getting the vibe here? It’s hard to mess this up.):
- 3 ¾ cups of all purpose or whole wheat flour (I usually use 3 cups all purpose and ¾ cup whole wheat.)
- 2 teaspoons salt
- ½ teaspoon Yeast (I like Fleischmann’s Active Dry Yeast)
- 1 ½ cups Water (some say use warm, but based on my experience, it doesn’t matter)
Instructions:
Mix all ingredients in a large bowl. Cover with a dish towel or bread cloth and leave on your counter until you’re ready to make pizza (Or at least 6 hours. I usually give mine 12 hours). This recipe makes two medium sized thin crust pizzas or one thick crust.
When you get home from work it’s time to turn your dough into pizza. I recommend using a pizza stone, but you can use a cookie sheet if you don’t have a stone. The time the pizza takes from start to finish will vary, but most days I’d say I go from spreading dough to eating pizza in thirty minutes or less.
I like a thin crust pizza, so I usually split my dough in half, one to use and one to freeze for the next week. The half I use thinly covers a family sized pizza stone. I recommend lightly coating your stone or cookie sheet in olive oil so your crust doesn’t stick, then spread your dough evenly with your hands. Leaving the olive oil on your hands from coating the stone will help the dough not stick to you as you press it out. Then stick it on a high rack in your oven under the broiler. The amount of time it will need to be in there varies. Mine usually takes about five minutes, but you want the dough to be cooked and no longer sticky. Depending on your taste, you might want to let the dough get a little charred on top. I try to avoid that because I’ve read studies that show that the molecules in charred food can cause cancer and I’m a health nut.
Once your dough is cooked to your liking all you have to do is add whatever toppings you want. I like to go through my veggie drawer and add a little of everything. A typical pizza in my house has chopped onion, pepper, mushrooms, kale, and zucchini, but if I happen to have leftovers of something like asparagus or brussel sprouts I’ll throw those on there too. You’ll be amazed how tasty it is. I don’t bother cooking any of them first and I just do a rough chop. The few minutes in the oven will cook them just enough to be perfectly crunchy, but not raw.
You can go sauce or no sauce. My kids like plain cheese and sauce so I usually make a couple slices like that and a veggie side for my husband and I.
Whatever you do, I recommend you put the cheese on last, especially if you’re using kale or sun dried tomatoes. They burn easily and the cheese will shield them from burning.
When your pizza is ready, place it in the oven at 475 degrees until the top starts to bubble. Boom, healthy dinner is ready.
I usually pair pizza with a fruit and yogurt smoothie for my kiddos and a glass of red wine for me. If you like spice I recommend topping your pizza with hot pepper flakes. And my super TOP SECRET INGREDIENT is a few shakes of Old Bay Seasoning on top. So good!
If you’re not into veggie style pizza but you still want to keep it healthy, try sauteeing some shrimp to put on top or add chunks of rotisserie chicken. I’d add those after cooking or make sure they are pre-cooked and you hide them under cheese so they don’t get dried out.
I hope you enjoy this easy weekday meal. I’ve been making it nearly once a week for over a decade now and I still look forward to it every week.
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