Tag Archive for: pizza

Spicy Goat Cheese Pesto Pizza

Italian flavors with a twist in one delicious spicy goat cheese pesto pizza loaded with fresh cherry tomatoes, mozzarella and black olives. I could eat this pizza every day!

Italian flavors with a twist in one delicious spicy goat cheese pesto pizza loaded with fresh cherry tomatoes, mozzarella and black olives. I could eat this pizza every day!

Wow, the summer this year. I can’t complain. Sunny weather, nice breeze and Aperol spritz in the evenings – what else could I wish for? The baby is sleeping very well so far, during the night as well as the day and his playtimes are getting longer. Finally! I absolutely love singing to him with his curious eyes on me all the time 🙂

In a couple of days we’re heading for some much needed vacations beside a beautiful lake under the mountains. Even though we love the seaside, we’re more of a lake and river type of swimmers. We love the sunny beaches and the waves by the sea, but hate the salt. The place we’re going to is quite isolated with just a couple of vacation houses nearby. So hopefully we’ll get some peace and quiet.

Italian flavors with a twist in one delicious spicy goat cheese pesto pizza loaded with fresh cherry tomatoes, mozzarella and black olives. I could eat this pizza every day!
Italian flavors with a twist in one delicious spicy goat cheese pesto pizza loaded with fresh cherry tomatoes, mozzarella and black olives. I could eat this pizza every day! Italian flavors with a twist in one delicious spicy goat cheese pesto pizza loaded with fresh cherry tomatoes, mozzarella and black olives. I could eat this pizza every day!

Okay back to the recipe. I have a ton of basil in the garden. A couple of years ago I sowed an entire bag of seeds in one small pot and it turned out the best idea ever. Why? Because you can start picking basil as soon as it starts growing leaves. Of course it’s way too crowded and I pick the whole plants in the begining to decrowd the pot. I leave some to grow into big bushy plants.

Basil was the whole inspiration for this recipe. I love pesto esecially with basil. I tried making it with goat cheese and it is seriously delicious. Add some mozzarela, tomatoes and olives and put all of them on the best pizza dough and you’ve got a treat. I included an amazing and very easy pizza dough recipe, but you can use your own. My whole-grain spelt dough would work just as well.

Italian flavors with a twist in one delicious spicy goat cheese pesto pizza loaded with fresh cherry tomatoes, mozzarella and black olives. I could eat this pizza every day!

This pizza dough rises slowly in the fridge for a day and it is the best pizza dough I’ve made to this date. In fact most pizza places will make the dough in advance as well. Slow rise at low temperatures makes the dough nice and elastic, so you can strech it out very thinly. I didn’t do this with this pizza, but I love making it super thin for my tomato sauce pizza only. Which reminds me… I should totally share the recipe. 

Second thing with making your pizza dough perfect is high temperature. Although I sometimes bake it at 230°C only, to make it more bready. Again look at the photos, the dough turns out looking something like that. If you crank up the temperature you’ll get an even crunchier crust. One thing I always do is place the baking tray in the oven when I turn it on, so it heats uo nicely. A pizza stone would be an even better option, but I don’t have one (yet) 🙂

Italian flavors with a twist in one delicious spicy goat cheese pesto pizza loaded with fresh cherry tomatoes, mozzarella and black olives. I could eat this pizza every day!

I’ll stop babbling and get to the recipe. Have a lovely day you guys!

Tag #useyournoodles so I can see your beautiful UYN creations. Also, stay in touch on Facebook and Instagram or subscribe to get the recipes directly to your mailbox ♥

Italian flavors with a twist in one delicious spicy goat cheese pesto pizza loaded with fresh cherry tomatoes, mozarella and black olives. I could eat this pizza every day!
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Spicy Goat Cheese Pesto Pizza

Servings 4 people

Ingredients

Pizza Dough

  • 4 cups bread flour
  • 1 1/2 cup lukewarm water
  • 1 sachet of yeast (7g)
  • 1 tsp sugar
  • 2 tsp salt

Goat Cheese Pesto

  • 1 cup chopped basil
  • 30 g mild goat cheese
  • 20 g parmesan
  • 3 TBSP pine nuts
  • 2 cloves garlic
  • 1 tsp chilli flakes
  • 3 TBSP olive oil (or more if necessary)

Spicy Goat Cheese Pesto Pizza

  • pizza dough
  • goat cheese pesto
  • 400 g mozzarella
  • 500 g cherry tomatoes
  • 100 g black olives
  • 2 tsp chilli flakes
  • basil for decoration

Instructions

Pizza Dough

  1. Mix all ingredients in a stand mixer or by hand. Knead for about 10 minutes or until the dough is smooth and soft, but not sticky.

  2. Slightly oil a big bowl with at least double the volume of the dough. Leave the dough rest in the bowl covered with plastic wrap for about an hour or until double the size.

  3. Knead again and return to the bowl. Cover with plastic wrap and save in the fridge for 24 hours. Be sure to use a large bowl, because the dough will continue rising in the fridge!

  4. Remove from the fridge, divide the dough into four an knead again to for four balls. Cover with a cloth and leave at room temperature at least an hour before using the dough. 

Goat Cheese Pesto

  1. Place all ingredients except basil into a food processor and pulse until finely chopped. Add basil and pulse for a few more seconds.

Spicy Goat Cheese Pesto Pizza

  1. Preheat the oven to 230°C or preferably as hugh as your oven goes leaving the baking tray or pizza stone in the oven. If using pizza stone make sure you leave it in the oven long enough to be extremely hot.

  2. Uncover the dough, but don't knead again from this point on. Use a small amount of flour to spread the dough into a desired shape. In this recipe form a 20 cm circle with a thick edge.

  3. Spread basil pesto over the thin center of the dough and cover with sliced or pulled-appart mozzarella. Top with cherry tomatoes, black olives and chilli flakes.

  4. Bake in the preheated oven for 10-15 minutes depending on the thickness of the crust.

  5. Decorate with more basil leaves before serving.

Italian flavors with a twist in one delicious spicy goat cheese pesto pizza loaded with fresh cherry tomatoes, mozzarella and black olives. I could eat this pizza every day!

Pizza Stuffed Sweet Potatoes

These sweet potatoes are filled with a cheezy pizza stuffing. A perfect way to make pizza without the crust!

Use Your Noodles - Pizza Stuffed Sweet Potatoes

Pizza is one of my favorite foods. I can eat it in any form, regular crust, cauliflower crust, loaded with cheese or only with a deliciously simple tomato sauce. You name it, I eat it! 

Sweet potatoes go into same category. I can eat it whenever, breakfast, lunch, dinner or midnight snack 😉

So this week I’m bringing those two together. In the shape of a decadent pizza stuffed sweet potatoes. Are you excited? I sure am!

These sweet potatoes are filled with a cheezy pizza stuffing

We’ve been working hard on our dance show, which will premiere in a month. If you are interested in how it looked the previous years, go see Tribal Bizzare site. As you would imagine, we’re spending a lot of time practicing, sewing costumes and making props for the show. It’s an exciting time! Stresfull, but fun at the same time. If you’ve got some interesting hobbies of your own, I’d love to hear about them in the comments 🙂 🙂 🙂

Use Your Noodles - Pizza Stuffed Sweet Potatoes

Ok, back to the sweet potatoes! This recipe is a little quicker that the usuall stuffed sweet potatoes. I cut the potatoes in half before baking, which shortenes the baking time and it makes the top of the sweet potato flesh even sweeter. After it is baked I mash the flesh and add A LOT of stuffing, then press it in the potato, so I can add some more on the top. Haha! These here, look almost roud, I pressed so much stuffing in. But that’s ok, right? 

Sweet potatoes are basically quilt-free comfort food. All sweet and yummy, but with a low IG and loads of vitamins and minerals. 

I love the fact that we can eat the skins. When I was a child, my mum would allways peel the potatoes (note: sweet potatoes were nowhere to be found in Slovenia at that time). We’d only eat the spring potatoes with the skin still on, otherwise it was chopped off! Later I realized that the skins are actually the best part of a potatoes. ♥ It goes the same with sweet potatoes.

Use Your Noodles - Pizza Stuffed Sweet Potatoes

Tag #useyournoodles so I can see your beautiful UYN creations. Also, stay in touch on Facebook and Instagram or subscribe to get the recipes directly to your mailbox ♥

And now…drumrolllllllllllll…the recipe –>

These sweet potatoes are filled with a cheezy pizza stuffing
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PIZZA STUFFED SWEET POTATOES

Course Appetizer, Main Course, Side Dish
Keyword stuffed potatoes
Total Time 45 minutes
Servings 3 people

Ingredients

  • 1 kg sweet potatoes
  • 100 g champignons or any other mushroom that you like sliced thinly
  • 200 g mozzarella cheese 1 cm cubes
  • 100 g cherry tomatoes deseeded and cut into small pieces
  • 30 g olives sliced thinly
  • a handful of basil chopped

Instructions

  1. Preheat the oven to 200 °C.
  2. Wash and dry your sweet potatoes. Cut them in half and oil it on both sides with olive oil. Add a little salt and pepper.
  3. Place potato halves cut side down on a baking tray lined with baking paper.
  4. Bake sweet potatoes for 30 minutes, or until they are soft when poked with a fork.
  5. 10 minutes before the sweet potatoes are done fry the mushrooms in a pan with a little oil, until they get golden. This will take a couple of minutes.
  6. In a bowl, prepare the stuffing. Mix mushrooms, mozzarella cheese, cherry tomatoes, olives, and basil.
  7. When sweet potatoes are done, take them out of the oven and turn them around.
  8. With a fork, mash the flesh and add seasoning if necessary. Stuff them with cheese mixture and press it down firmly. Add any left mixture on top.
  9. Return to the oven for 5 – 10 minutes, until cheese has melted and got a light golden color.

Use Your Noodles - Pizza Stuffed Sweet Potatoes

Mini Pumpkin Pizzas

This are seriously delicious pizzas. Even though they don’t have any tomato sauce they are creamy and crunchy. And I’m loving the colours here. Colour means nutrients, right?

Use Your Noodles - Mini Pumpkin Pizzas

Last year I was vacationing in Italy a few times and I must say I fell in love with its people, food and beautiful sights. I was there before, duh (it’s our neighbouring country)! It’s just that my way of visiting a country has changed over the years. I used to travel in a rush, I had to see everything. I even felt a little dissapointed if I missed something out. During my travels I’ve realised that being a tourist shouldn’t mean, you’ve seen all the sights and been to all the places listed in your travel guide. It’s slowing down to have time to observe how people of other cultures interact, what they do, how they talk, what they eat, what they wear. It’s talking to locals and relaxing over a cold beer or a hot cup of coffee. It’s also seeing the nice places, but those that you really appreciate and will stick in your memory.

If I think of Italy and my travels there, I immediately think of pizza and pasta. I know, a cliche. But the fact is that although Italians have a lot of other thing to offer culinary-wise, pizza and pasta are the ones that stick out! You can’t miss those.

Mini Pumpkin Pizzas

Here in Slovenia, the pizzas in restaurants are full of different ingredients. They are totally different than in Italy. Good, but different. If I’m honest, I prefered the ones from Italy. They can make a simple pizza with tomato sauce only feel like you are in heaven. This pizza by the way is now my favourite kind of pizza!

Mini Pumpkin Pizzas

But enough about the Italian pizzas. I’m here to make a totally different pizza with all but the usual ingredients. This pizza does not have tomato or cheese. Think of it more like a winter comfort pizza. Instead of tomato sauce I’m using pumpkin puree flavoured with smoked paprika and oregano. The toppings are chard, chickpeas, capers, sesame, chilli pepper and lemon juice. I assure you these mini pumpkin pizzas are yummy.

Tag #useyournoodles so I can see your beautiful UYN creations. Also, stay in touch on Facebook and Instagram or subscribe to get the recipes directly to your mailbox ♥

Mini Pumpkin Pizzas
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MINI PUMPKIN PIZZAS

24 pieces of 10 cm pizzas

Course Appetizer, Main Course, Side Dish, Snack
Keyword pizza dough, spelt pizza dough, wholegrain pizza dough
Total Time 3 hours
Servings 4

Ingredients

PIZZA DOUGH (~400 GRAMS)

  • 3 cups wholegrain spelt flour
  • 1 1/3 cup hot water about 40 °C
  • 1/2 tsp honey or sugar
  • 1 1/2 tsp instant yeast
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 2 TBSP olive oil

PUMPKIN SAUCE

  • 2 cups pumpkin puree
  • 2 tsp smoked paprika
  • 2 TBSP dried or fresh oregano
  • salt
  • black pepper

TOPPINGS

  • 12 chard leaves only greens not stalks
  • 3/4 cup cooked chickpeas
  • 1/4 cup salted capers
  • 3 TBSP sesame seeds
  • 1/2 big medium-hot chili sliced thinly
  • 1 or 2 lemons cut into wedges

Instructions

PIZZA DOUGH

  1. Put the flour in a bowl and make a well in the middle. Pour hot water in the well, add honey and dissolve it in the water. Add yeast to the water and dissolve it.
  2. Then start incorporating flour little by little, until the mixture has the consistency of a soft yogurt (note: not all the flour, just a few tablespoons). Cover the bowl with a cloth and leave in a warm place for 15 minutes, or until the mixture starts bubbling and rising.
  3. Then add salt and oil and start stirring with a wooden spoon from the center and slowly incorporating the rest of the flour.
  4. When the dough stops sticking to the spoon, start kneading in the bowl with your hands.
  5. As soon as your dough starts coming together and you’ve used almost all the flour, you can transfer the dough to a smooth surface. Knead the dough for 10 minutes. If the dough sticks to the surface add a little remaining flour from the bowl. If it does not stick, it is not necessary to add more flour. Because all flours are a little different you might end up with a bit flour left, or you have to add a bit more (but not more than 1/4 cup).
  6. Take another bowl and coat it with oil, then transfer the dough into this bowl and turn it around, so all the sides of the dough are oiled. Cover the bowl with a plastic seal or a plate. Leave it to rise in a warm place for about 1 – 2 hours until it has it is double the size.
  7. When it has doubled, punch it to push the excess air out and knead quickly (only a few kneads). Cut the dough first into four, then into two, then into three. You should end up with 24 tiny dough balls.

MAKING PIZZAS

  1. Roll every ball of dough into circles about 10 cm wide. You can use a rolling pin or the palm of your hand.
  2. Lightly flour the surface and place the pizza circles on it. Cover with a cloth or plastic foil and leave to rise for 30 minutes.
  3. Preheat the oven to 220 °C. Leave the baking tray in the oven, so it also gets heated.
  4. Meanwhile combine the pumpkin puree, smoked paprika, oregano, and salt and black pepper by taste.
  5. In a pan boil the water, add the chard leaves and cook for 1-2 minutes. Take out of the water and cut into smaller pieces.
  6. After 30 minutes take out the tray, cover it with baking paper, and place pizzas on the paper.
  7. Spread the pumpkin puree over the pizza (about 1 TBSP per pizza), top with chard, chickpeas, and capers.
  8. Return the tray to the oven and bake for 10-12 minutes. The dough should be soft on the inside, but crispy on the outside.
  9. When it is baked, take out of the oven and top with slices of chilly and sesame seeds.
  10. Serve with wedges of lemon, so everyone can add as much lemon juice to the top as they want.

Notes

If you can’t get all 24 pizzas in the oven at once, don’t worry, bake it in two or three batches. The remaining flattened dough will wait until the pizzas are done, nothing wrong with that. When the first batch is done, remove the baked pizzas from the tray and repeat it from number 6 (Instructions for the pizzas).
A simple way to make your own pumpkin puree is to cut the pumpkin in half. Season with a little oil, salt, and black pepper and bake at 180 °C until the pumpkin is tender (30 minutes to 1 hour depending on the size of the pumpkin). Then blend.

Mini Pumpkin Pizzas

PRINT THIS RECIPE AND MAKE YOUR PERSONALIZED USE YOUR NOODLES COOKBOOK

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Mini Pumpkin Pizzas
Use Your Noodles - Mini Pumpkin Pizzas