Wednesday, June 29, 2011

Whole Wheat Pizza Dough


Servings: makes 3- 12 inch regular crust or 3- 18 inch thin crust
  • 1 tablespoon active dry yeast
  • 1 1/2 cups warm water
  • 2 1/2 cups whole wheat  flour
  • 1 cup all purpose or white flour
  • 1 Tbs olive oil
  • pinch of salt
Put the warm water in a bowl, you will need it to be pretty warm.  Add the yeast and use a fork or whisk to dissolve the yeast.  Set aside for 5 minutes, until you see it slowly bubbling.
Sift to combine the flours and put into a large bowl or stand mixer.  Create a divot into the flour and pour the yeast mixture, olive oil and salt.  Slowly push the flours into the yeast mixture and combine until dough begins to form.  If using stand mixture, start on low speed to prevent flour from flying everywhere and then slowly bring up to medium speed.
If dough is not coming together, add 1 tablespoon of water at a time and remix until dough forms.  If dough is too loose or sticky, add tablespoon of flour.
Once dough is thoroughly combined, remove from bowl.  Put dough ball into a clean bowl with dash of olive oil, roll dough ball into olive oil.  ”Score” top of dough ball by drawing an X with a knife  and then cover bowl with damp cloth/towel/paper towel etc.  Set aside for 1 -2 hours or until dough has doubled in size.
After dough has doubled, punch the ball down and divide into 3 equal portions.
You can freeze the dough for later use or roll out on lightly floured surface and use immediately.   For thin crust, stretch dough and let sit aside for 15 minutes prior to putting into the hot oven.  If during the 15 minute period the dough shrinks back, re-stretch.
Bake at 400 degrees for 10-15 minutes.

Thursday, June 23, 2011

Walnut, green onion and gargonzola chicken


Preheat a cast iron pot or dutch oven on medium high heat.  Add oil near end of assembly.
Servings: 2
Ingredients:
  • 2 chicken breasts
  • 5-6 stalks of green onion (individual strands, not bulbs)
  • 1/3 cup low fat Gorgonzola cheese
  • 1/4 cup walnuts
  • 1 cup chicken broth (or you could use water)
  • 1 tablespoon flour
  • 1-2 tablespoons of oil
Lay chicken breast flat on cutting board, place one palm on chicken breast, with the other hand use the knife to cut a slit parallel into to the board.   Lift up the flap you have just created and continue to slice the breast- as if to butterfly it.   Do not cut the breast entire into two pieces.
Slice the green onion into 1/4inch circles.  Chop walnuts loosely.  Divide green onion, walnuts and cheese equally between both breasts.  Roll the breast up and pin together in a roll using a toothpick.  Place chicken into hot oil pan.  Let cook on side for 5 mins then rotate 90 degrees.  Do this so all 4 sides get browned.  At this point the chicken is probably cooked- verify with kitchen thermometer 175 degrees.
Remove cooked chicken rolls to side pan.  Pour cold chicken broth directly into hot pan.  Use spoon to scrape up brown goodies and cheese off bottom of pan.  Add flour to brown and whisk to combine.  Bring to boil and then let thicken to personal preference.
Pour gravy on top of chicken roll and serve.
Tip:  I mix the flour in a ramekin with broth or water first and then add.  It avoids lumps.

Thursday, June 16, 2011

Parmesan Portabella Mushrooms


Serves 2.
Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
Add enough oil to cover bottom of cast iron pan or other fry pan, and turn pan to medium high heat.
Ingredients:
  • 1 prepackaged uncut portabella mushrooms (normally comes 2-3 in package)
  • 3/4 cup panko breadcrumbs
  • 3/4 cup flour
  • 1 egg
  • 1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese
  • 4 thin slices fresh mozzarella cheese
  • whole wheat spaghetti (or if you’re really opposed regular spaghetti works just fine!)
  • salt to taste
For tomato sauce:
See my Go To Tomato Sauce
For mushrooms:
Flip over and use spoon to remove gills on underside.  Then cut each mushroom into 3-4 slices.  Put in bowl and cover with flour.  Make sure to coat all mushrooms.  In a second bowl, add the egg plus 2 tablespoons of water and whisk.  In third bowl, add panko and parmesan cheese.  Dip flour covered mushrooms in egg then in the panko-parm and then place into hot oil in the cast iron skillet/fry pan.  Let cook 2 mins or until golden and flip. After both sides are golden, place mushrooms into baking dish.
Cover breaded mushrooms with the tomato sauce and top with sliced mozzarella cheese.  Place dish in oven for 10 minutes (while this bakes, you can be cooking your spaghetti- make sure to salt that water!).
If cheese is not as brown and melted as preferred, turn on broiler- but only for 1-2 minutes and WATCH! the stove.  The cheese will go from white to burnt in seconds!!!
Serve baked Parmesan portabellas on top of your favorite spaghetti.
Note: If you have left over baby-bellas from another application, these also will work well. Just flour, and bread as if they were large portabellas.

Friday, June 10, 2011

Whole Wheat Pancakes


Servings: 3
Start by putting a griddle or non-stick skillet on stove top set to medium-high heat.
Ingredients:
  • 1/3 cup whole-wheat flour
  • 1/3 cup all-purpose flour
  • 1 teaspoons baking powder
  • 1/4 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1/8 teaspoon salt
  • 1 large eggs
  • 1 1/3 cup unsweetend silk almond milk (you can use a regular low fat milk but the almond milk adds a nice flavor and I don’t drink milk from a cow :) )
  • 2 teaspoons Splenda Brown Sugar Blend
  • 1 tablespoon cinnamon
Combine flours, baking power and baking soda.  Then add sugar, egg, salt and milk.  Whisk to combine.
Pour 1/4 cup batter onto hot pan.  Flip when edges are golden and top is bubbled.
Serve immediately with usual favorite pancake accouterments: butter, syrup, chopped fruit (see below)
Upgrade it:
Add chopped fruit to aliquoted batter in pan as it cooks and top with a little more batter.  Alternatively, put chopped fruit onto cooked pancake.