Monday, February 2, 2009

Veggie Pizza

Hubbie and I just love pizza. One of the challenges we face on the migraine diet is being able to continue eating the foods we love. We used to make homemade pizza all the time, but the pizza we made included cheese, meat, and yeast-all foods that are now off limits. We have played around with dough recipes, and this one is our favorite!

Pizza Sauce
-6 oz tomato paste ($0.25)
-14 oz tomato sauce ($0.50)
-Garlic powder
-Salt
-Italian seasonings mix

Seasoning price is negligable, probably about $0.05-$0.10.
1. Combine all ingredients in a small size pan. Add garlic powder, salt, and Italian seasonings to taste.
2. Cook until well combined, adding more seasonings as needed.

Toppings ($3.94)
You may use any toppings you wish. We do not use cheese or meat on our pizza, so our ingredients are a little different than the normal pizza toppings. This time we put shredded carrots, mushrooms, red pepper, zucchini, squash, and red onions. We normally chop the ingredients up and sauté for a few minutes before adding them to the pizza. You can skip this step if you like your veggies more crispy.

Crust-This is a double recipe for the dough. We used it to make two pizzas, one for today, and one for lunches later this week. You can cut all the ingredients in half and have enough dough for one pizza.
-3 cups flour ($1.20) (You can use any variety of whole wheat/white. I used half wheat and half white flour.)
-4 tablespoons olive oil ($0.40)
-1 ½ tablespoons baking powder
-½ tablespoon baking soda
-1 tsp salt
-1 tsp sugar
-1 cup water
Guestimate price for baking soda, baking powder, salt and sugar are about $0.25.

1. Preheat oven to 375
2. Combine all the ingredients in a large bowl, and mix well to combine. I use my Kitchen Aid Mixer.
3. Transfer the dough to a floured surface and knead for several minutes. I let my mixer knead the dough for me.
4. Roll dough into desired shape for your baking pan. I use a round and a rectangular baking stone. A cookie sheet would also work fine.
5. Transfer dough to the baking pan, and pre-bake for 3-5 minutes. Dough should just start to cook before you take it out of the oven.
6. Spoon pizza sauce onto pizza.
7. Top with your favorite toppings and bake. Bake for about 15 minutes. If you choose to use cheese on your pizza, bake until the cheese is bubbly and just starts to brown.

Cost Breakdown
Toppings- $3.94- a little pricey for us, but we splurged and bought a special veggie tray to try.
Pizza sauce- $.85
Pizza dough-$1.85

Total cost for two yummy, healthy pizzas is $6.64. If you break it down, that's only $3.32 for each pizza. Each pizza is at least one meal for us, sometimes two. If you used less expensive ingredients, like just carrots and onions, the price would be even less!

For more frugal meals and to be a part of the $5 Dinner Challenge, visit http://www.5dollardinners.com/

3 comments:

  1. This was the second time we tried the no cheese pizza. After the first time I asked for it agin very quickly. At first we were tried to put fake cheese on it but it didn't add any taste, and the texture did not add to the quality. It turned to be a waste of time and money. This pizza was great and it looks like we have enough for two days of lunch, so I'm excited about getting to have it more than once.

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  2. Yum! Can you email me more specifics on the migraine diet? Hadn't heard of it. I'm curious :)

    Thanks!
    Erin

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