"tomorrow is farm day so use up any leftover produce" grilled pizza

Tomorrow is our CSA pick-up at the farm so I'll be coming home with a bunch of fresh produce and I needed to make room in the fridge. Besides I don't need to accumulate produce from week to week or it will just end up lost in the bottom of the crisper until it eventually gets thrown in the compost. So the pizza today was a hodge podge of any leftover produce. A scrumptious hodge podge!

Although the heat wave is officially over my body is still feeling the unbelievable heat and stuffiness from yesterday so I couldn't stand the idea of turning on the oven. Instead I decided to make a grilled pizza, something I hadn't done in quite awhile. The toppings I had were perfect for a grilled pizza b/c they all needed to be precooked anyway. On a grilled pizza the toppings don't get cooked on the pizza so if they need more than a simple warming they need to be pre-cooked.

On the pizza:

• Root Vegetable Marinara (a favorite in our household b/c it tastes surprisingly like tomato)
  
• 2 small fennel bulbs - thinly sliced
  
• whites and greens of 2 leeks - thinly sliced
• half a dozen chard leaves - sliced in thin strips
• 1 medium zucchini
• As always we passed the nutritional yeast and red pepper flakes at the table.
  

Note: The only items not from the farm were some of the seasonings in the marinara, the olive oil, the crust, the nutritional yeast, and the red pepper flakes. This is truely a seasonal pizza!

The fennel and leeks were sauteed in olive oil until soft and slightly brown. I stirred in the chard as the leeks and fennel finished cooking and turned off the burner.

The zucchini was brushed with olive oil and grilled for a few minutes on each side.

The overall pizza was delicious!! The grilled crust was crispy and flavorful and all the toppings went really well together. I gave it an 8 and really only because zucchini just isn't my favorite vegetable (although I must admit prepared this way it was better than normal). K on the other hand loves zucchini so he gave it a 9 -- I think he is holding out rating anything a 10. Of course, "I could eat this every day" is a pretty high standard to achieve.

southwestern flair in green

It has been awhile since we've made pizza, mostly because it has been too hot to turn on the oven lately. This week we have been getting some thunderstorms and rain which is really cooling things off so I fired up the oven and made a pizza last night - yum!

It was a rather unusual pizza that I made, but it tasted pretty good. I made my own whole wheat pizza crust (actually half whole wheat and half white flour). The sauce was an herb & black bean puree which had cilantro, basil, garlic scapes, garlic, cumin, lime, nutritional yeast, salt, and obviously, black beans. For toppings, I sauteed some summer squash and mushrooms and I also added slices of avocado when the pizza came out of the oven. As always we passed red pepper flakes and more nutritional yeast at the table.

On the new 10 point scale we give this a 7. It looked pretty in a rather monochromatic way but some brilliant red would have enhanced the visual apeal as well as the flavor. My preference would have been some slices of fresh tomato (the tomatoes at the farm are still green so we won't be seeing them for another week or so.) K suggested roasted red peppers on his half which I agree would taste good as well. I might also throw some olives on next time.