Butternut Squash Pizza Recipe

Butternut Squash Pizza

Every Autumn my mom makes an amazing butternut squash lasagna. I have wanted to use the key ingredients from her recipe for a pizza since the beginning of my pizza project, so when a butternut squash was included in our share from The Good Food Collective I jumped at the opportunity.

I diced the butternut squash, sprayed it with canola oil, added some salt and pepper, then roasted it in the oven until it softened a bit. For a base to the pizza, I blended ricotta cheese with pesto sauce, then spread that on the pre-baked dough. I added the squash and sauteed onions and then let it bake.

This pizza was a great idea; it was so delicious! The roasted squash had a sweet flavor that complimented the pesto cheese spread very well. My butternut squash pizza was a great kick-off to the fall pizza season!

Garlic Scape Pesto and Chard Pizza Recipe

One of my new favorite things about summer is our membership with The Good Food Collective. Each week we pick up a batch of fresh, local fruits and veggies. Usually there is a veggie we don’t typically cook with so this provides me with a fun challenge of trying new recipes and creating new pizzas.

Our first batch of the season included garlic scapes and chard. I learned about garlic scapes last year and tried a snack recipe with this curly green vegetable, which turned out to be delicious. But this year I wanted to try garlic scape pesto. The recipe was very similar to basil based pesto, using parmesan cheese, almonds, and olive oil. The recipe just calls for garlic scapes instead of basil. I blended these ingredients in a food processor, then spread the pesto on pre-baked dough, sprinkled on mozzarella cheese and added sauteed chard. The pizza baked for about 10 minutes and the aroma that escaped the oven while baking was mouthwatering!

The garlic scape pesto tasted different from basil based pesto, but it was still delicious! My garlic scape pesto and chard pizza was great start to our season of fresh and local veggies. I am really looking forward to incorporating other less common veggies into my pizzas in the weeks to come!

Pesto Pepperoni Pizza Recipe

We recently invited Andrew’s students Lauren and Ashley (and Ashley’s boyfriend Scott)  to the house to celebrate the end of the school year. At Ashley’s request I prepared a Buffalo Chicken Wing pizza, but wasn’t sure what to make for the second pizza. Andrew suggested a traditional pepperoni pizza, but I thought it would be fun to combine two pizza from last year into one mouth watering pizza: my Pesto Pizza (#26) and my Pepperoni  Pizza (#52).

I started by spreading homemade pesto sauce on pre-baked dough. Next, I sprinkled on mozzarella cheese and loaded on the pepperoni. The simple nature in which I prepared the pizza did not reflect its taste. It was fantastic! One of my favorite sauces and one of my favorite toppings together to make pesto pepperoni pizza. Delish!

Grilled Sun-Dried Tomato Pesto, Chicken and Olive Pizza Recipe

We have been waiting to grill pizza all winter long, so we jumped at the opportunity this weekend.  After grilling the dough on one side for four minutes and flipping, we began dressing the pizza. First we slathered on store bought sun-dried tomato pesto, sprinkled on feta cheese, lemon garlic chicken and sliced kalamata olives. We let it sit for a few minutes to give the dough a chance to get nice and crispy and for the cheese to melt a bit. Once again, grilled pizza did not disappoint. The flavors of all the toppings on this grilled pizza really popped! I have a feeling we will be getting a lot of use out the grill this summer!

Grilled Basil Pesto, Chicken and Peppers Pizza Recipe

Grilled pizza season is here! We removed the cover, dusted it off and fired up the grill. One of my favorite things about grilling pizza is the team work Andrew and I put in to make these beautiful creations. He started by grilling chicken that had been stewing in a lemon garlic marinade. Andrew then sliced the grilled chicken while I rolled out the dough and placed it on my new grill pan.

We grilled the dough for  four minutes, then flipped it over. Next, we started assembling the toppings. First to go on was homemade basil pesto sauce, then mozzarella cheese, chicken and roasted red peppers. We grilled the pizza four additional minutes, until the bottom was nice and crispy. I then moved the pizza to the top shelf and closed the lid until the cheese melted. The grill cooks the dough in such a different way than in the oven. The crust turns out lighter, airy and crispier. The toppings had a smoky flavor and the whole pizza was brilliant!

#10: Kelly’s Pizza Recipe 2/27/10

Pesto Prosciutto Pizza

Andrew and I had his parents over for dinner today. I planned on making pizza and I asked for their pizza preferences. Ron told me they like healthy ingredients; he remembered mushrooms were out of the question because Andrew doesn’t like them, and he requested no octopus or bananas. This was disappointing because I was planning on testing out my new banana, octopus concoction that I had just perfected! I was however, excited to try a variation of a healthy pizza recipe from the book my friend, Nicole, got me for Christmas. My pizza included sun-dried tomato pesto, spinach, mozzarella cheese and prosciutto to top it off. The sun-dried tomato pesto was a nice change from my normal marinara, but no worries Prego, I am not abandoning my favorite sauce. This pizza was excellent and was super healthy!