Greek Pizza and Other Weekend Eats

I love the 4th of July, especially when the holiday falls on a Monday. It always means a weekend full of fireworks, food, and fun. We had a great time at our family cookout on Friday night (although, with a 2-year-old, we had to leave before the fireworks began). Yesterday, we began our day with a nice family run (that is, my hubby and I ran and pushed our son in the jogging stroller!) and then drove to LL Bean in the late afternoon/evening just to get out and go somewhere. Since I wasn't sure if there'd be any vegan-friendly restaurants in the area, I packed sandwiches and snacks for us to take with us.

Of course, with the three of us, that means three completely different sandwiches :) I had almond butter, banana, cinnamon, and raisin; hubby had cashew butter, almond butter, cinnamon, raisins, and jam; and my son had sunflower seed butter, cinnamon and jam. At least we all ate the same kind of bread.

I also packed some drinks and some bags of Trader Joe's Lite Kettle Korn. We'd never tried it before, but all three of us loved it!

After church today, I made some Basic Scrambled Tofu and Cornbread Waffles from Vegan Brunch. I added spinach, kalamata olives, red onion, broccoli, and ketchup to my scramble. Along with a cup (or four) of carrot juice, it was a tasty, filling lunch.

For dinner tonight, we wanted to have pizza so I looked in the fridge and pantry to see what I could find. I'd bought some baby spinach earlier in the day, so I thought a Greek pizza might be nice. While my hubby made the dough, I sliced some red onion and tomato and chopped up some spinach and kalamata olives. I layered the dough with some pizza sauce, basil pesto, tomato, spinach, red onion, kalamata olives, and some Daiya vegan mozzarella cheese and baked it on our pizza stone.

I was really happy with how easy this pizza was to make - and tasty, too! My son devoured it, which made his Mommy happy since it was loaded with fresh veggies.

Here's my pizza recipe:

Easy Greek Pizza
Serves 2 hungry adults and 1 hungry toddler

First, place a pizza stone in your oven and preheat to 450 degrees. Then, start making the dough:

Dough:
1 cup white whole wheat flour
1/2 cup whole wheat pastry flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1/4 teaspoon dried basil
1/4 teaspoon dried oregano
2 tablespoons olive oil
1/2 cup water

In a large bowl, mix the flours, baking powder, sea salt, basil, and oregano. Make a well in the center, then add the olive oil and water. Incorporate the liquids and the dry ingredients until combined, then knead dough on a floured surface for 5-7 minutes. Stretch dough into a round shape (keep in mind, since this is a "quick" dough and not a yeasted dough, it doesn't stretch like a normal dough would. Just use your hands and shape it into a circle). Place on a greased metal pizza pan, then place pan on pizza stone. Bake for 5 minutes, then remove from oven and top with pizza ingredients.

Toppings:
1 large vine-ripened tomato, sliced thinly and blotted well with paper towels
1/4-1/3 cup kalamata olives, chopped
2 large handfuls baby spinach, chopped
1/4 of a medium red onion, thinly sliced, then chopped
1 cup Daiya vegan mozzarella
basil pesto, to taste
pizza sauce, to taste

Top pizza as follows: pizza sauce, basil pesto, sliced tomatoes, spinach, red onion, kalamata olives, Daiya mozzarella.

Bake an additional 10 minutes. Slice and serve!

The only thing that would make this perfect is to have some leftover CCK Deep-Dish Cookie Pie for dessert - but alas, it's all gone :( I'm sure I'll be making more very soon...like tomorrow, maybe?