Pizza and Pesto

Tonight was homemade pizza night at our house. 

 It took three different pizza's to please everyone.

Honey Pizza Dough

1 package active dry yeast

1 tsp honey

1 cup warm water

2 1/2 cups flour

1 tsp salt

1 tsp olive oil

In a small bowl, dissolve the yeast and honey in 1/4-cup warm water (100-110 degrees).

In a mixer fitted with a dough hook, combine the flour and the salt. (can do by hand with spoon if you don't have a mixer).
Add the oil, the yeast mixture, and the remaining 3/4 C water, mix on low speed until dough comes cleanly away from the sides of the bowl and clusters around the dough hook, about 5 minutes.
If the dough is still sticky, then simply add a bit more flour until it pulls cleanly away from the hook.

Turn the dough out onto a clean work surface and knead by hand 2 or 3 minutes.
The dough should be smooth and firm. Place in lightly oiled bowl an cover with plastic wrap.
Let sit for about 30-45 minutes. (When ready, the dough will stretch as it is lightly pulled).
Take dough out of bowl and divide into either 2 balls
Work each ball by pulling down the sides and tucking under the bottom of the ball. Repeat 4 or 5 times.
Cover the dough with a damp towel and let rest 15 to 20 minutes.
At this point, the balls can be used or wrapped in plastic and refrigerated for up to 2 days.

To make pizzas, stretch out onto greased pizza pan, top with sauce and toppings, brush exposed crust with olive oil and extra honey if desired and bake at 450 degrees for 12-16 minutes, until done. (smaller pizzas will take less time, so keep watching it)

I decided to make a batch of pesto for my pizza - or Kellie decided to take over the pesto making, all the while telling me how yucky it sounded....We had this at a cousins house over the holidays and I might or might not have camped right in front of the bowl.  maybe.

This is the best pesto ever.  Ever.

It is worth every minute and calorie that might be in it.

You'll need to test it out with a cracker or ten.

Artichoke Pesto

adapted from Giada De Laurentiis

1 lg can artichoke hearts

1 cup fresh parsley leaves, packed down

1/2 cup chopped toasted walnuts

1 lemon, zested and juiced

2 cloves garlic

1/2 teaspoon kosher salt

1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

1/2 cup extra-virgin olive oil

2/3 cup grated Parmesan

In a food processor combine the artichokes, parsley, walnuts, lemon zest and juice, garlic, salt, and pepper and parmesan. Run the machine to finely chop all the ingredients, stopping the machine a few times to scrape down the sides. Then, with the machine running, drizzle in 1/2 cup extra-virgin olive oil.
Serve on toasted french bread slices, crackers, etc. 

I used the pesto on my pizza rather than sauce, yummy.

And, as usual, when I uploaded pictures there had been another photo shoot I was unaware of...

and looks like there might have been some jumping on the bed... or "off the bed" as I was told when I asked about it...