Green pizza
Mar. 21st, 2011 12:27 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
geeksoupNot quite a white pizza. Pictures to come later. This is a no-frills method for an AMAZING pizza.
Green Pizza
Oven at 520F (yes, kids, five hundred twenty degrees fahrenheit). This is for a raw-dough thin-crust pizza. If you are using a pre-made crust, follow package directions. Everything here is vegetarian, so you do not have to worry about cooking anything through.
Sauce:
7-8 cloves of pickled garlic in oil*
4-5 one-inch pieces of red pepper (optional)*
2 c spinach
1 tbsp olive oil
Toppings:
1 cup white cheese (we used farmer's, but any mild white cheese will do)
1 cup baby spinach leaves
4 large white mushrooms, sliced thinly or about 3/4 cup other thin-sliced mushrooms of choice
1/4 cup feta
1/4 cup shredded fresh parmesan
Optional:
onion marmalade (recipe follows)
Method:
For the sauce, combine all ingredients in a blender and pulse. Add oil if necessary. Spread onto crust. Top with cheese, spinach, mushrooms IN THAT ORDER, because if you do spinach leaves on top, either at a lower temperature for a longer time or a higher temperature for a shorter time, you will end up with crispy dehydrated spinach. Mash feta and parmesan together, sprinkle atop pizza.
Bake in your insanely hot oven for a mere 7-9 minutes, or by the directions provided by your crust. There are eleventy billion pizza crust recipes out there, so go nuts. This would also make an excellent topping for a French bread pizza. Or even a tortilla or a pita. I mean. Bread is a vehicle, right?
Onion Marmalade:
3 lb onions, peeled, cut lengthwise and sliced
1 stick butter
salt to taste (I use kosher, start with 1 tbsp)
splash of balsamic vinegar (probably around 1/8-1/4 cup)
1 tbsp sugar
There is a great myth about onions: that whenever you cook them in fat, it is a saute. It is not. There are times when you saute, and times when you sweat. Sweating the onions involves low heat, no color at all and only getting them to that translucent state at which they are still juuuuuust the tiniest bit crisp.
This is not one of those times.
Saute those bitches. You need to watch them, though. The higher the heat, the closer you watch. You're not shooting for nuclear, but somewhere between low and medium-high. If you're going low, expect to spend a couple of hours on these babies. If you're going higher, well, YMMV. Ultimately, you want something the color of milk chocolate.
Let me tell you something about onions, kids. They do this amazing thing when you cook them for this length of time. You're not just doing something as passe as pan-frying these things, you are bringing about a miraculous chemical change. This is turning something you might not even consider putting into your mouth raw into a buttery, sweet and savory spread that you will be happy to put on EVERYTHING. I dare you not to love this stuff. If you eat it with your pizza, you will only use a little bit. It's excellent on bread, and it would also be lovely with a steak or a big portobello mushroom sandwich. MMM.
*Our grocery store happens to have an "olive bar" at which can be found garlic and red peppers together in olive oil. The garlic is meant to be eaten raw, just like that, out of hand (and oh my is it good), as are the peppers. If you can't find this, use fewer garlic cloves and splash a bit of extra olive oil in, maybe 1/2 tbsp, combined with whatever peppers you like best, though those preserved in oil will match closest, I'd think. This will yield a very spicy green sauce.
Green Pizza
Oven at 520F (yes, kids, five hundred twenty degrees fahrenheit). This is for a raw-dough thin-crust pizza. If you are using a pre-made crust, follow package directions. Everything here is vegetarian, so you do not have to worry about cooking anything through.
Sauce:
7-8 cloves of pickled garlic in oil*
4-5 one-inch pieces of red pepper (optional)*
2 c spinach
1 tbsp olive oil
Toppings:
1 cup white cheese (we used farmer's, but any mild white cheese will do)
1 cup baby spinach leaves
4 large white mushrooms, sliced thinly or about 3/4 cup other thin-sliced mushrooms of choice
1/4 cup feta
1/4 cup shredded fresh parmesan
Optional:
onion marmalade (recipe follows)
Method:
For the sauce, combine all ingredients in a blender and pulse. Add oil if necessary. Spread onto crust. Top with cheese, spinach, mushrooms IN THAT ORDER, because if you do spinach leaves on top, either at a lower temperature for a longer time or a higher temperature for a shorter time, you will end up with crispy dehydrated spinach. Mash feta and parmesan together, sprinkle atop pizza.
Bake in your insanely hot oven for a mere 7-9 minutes, or by the directions provided by your crust. There are eleventy billion pizza crust recipes out there, so go nuts. This would also make an excellent topping for a French bread pizza. Or even a tortilla or a pita. I mean. Bread is a vehicle, right?
Onion Marmalade:
3 lb onions, peeled, cut lengthwise and sliced
1 stick butter
salt to taste (I use kosher, start with 1 tbsp)
splash of balsamic vinegar (probably around 1/8-1/4 cup)
1 tbsp sugar
There is a great myth about onions: that whenever you cook them in fat, it is a saute. It is not. There are times when you saute, and times when you sweat. Sweating the onions involves low heat, no color at all and only getting them to that translucent state at which they are still juuuuuust the tiniest bit crisp.
This is not one of those times.
Saute those bitches. You need to watch them, though. The higher the heat, the closer you watch. You're not shooting for nuclear, but somewhere between low and medium-high. If you're going low, expect to spend a couple of hours on these babies. If you're going higher, well, YMMV. Ultimately, you want something the color of milk chocolate.
Let me tell you something about onions, kids. They do this amazing thing when you cook them for this length of time. You're not just doing something as passe as pan-frying these things, you are bringing about a miraculous chemical change. This is turning something you might not even consider putting into your mouth raw into a buttery, sweet and savory spread that you will be happy to put on EVERYTHING. I dare you not to love this stuff. If you eat it with your pizza, you will only use a little bit. It's excellent on bread, and it would also be lovely with a steak or a big portobello mushroom sandwich. MMM.
*Our grocery store happens to have an "olive bar" at which can be found garlic and red peppers together in olive oil. The garlic is meant to be eaten raw, just like that, out of hand (and oh my is it good), as are the peppers. If you can't find this, use fewer garlic cloves and splash a bit of extra olive oil in, maybe 1/2 tbsp, combined with whatever peppers you like best, though those preserved in oil will match closest, I'd think. This will yield a very spicy green sauce.
