Homemade Pizza and Macaroni Casserole

Pizza

Ok, so fair warning. You need to make the pizza crust 24 hours in advance. I did not know this, and so we had to do some creative thinking to get the dough to rise fast enough for us to use it within an hour (but it still worked out great). We made two pizzas, one veggie and one with pepperoni (in order to appease Jessica and Chelsea who are apparently morally opposed to vegetables) and they both turned out great.

Ingredients

Crust (for 2 pizzas):

1 tsp of Active Dry or Instant Use

4 cups of flour

1 tsp salt

1/2 cup of olive oil

Toppings:

(we just used a random assortment of vegetables)

1 eggplant

grape tomatoes

minced garlic (two cloves)

2 green peppers

1/2 red onion

mushrooms

pepperoni

cheese

pizza sauce (we just bought this pre-made, making your own pizza sauce is probably not really worth the trouble)

Instructions

Yeast...apparently this stuff can be dangerous according to my roommate. I didn't ask questions, but just be careful...

we chopped...

and sliced...

and sauteed...

and broiled...

and listened/danced to michael jackson :)

the dough :) turned out well despite the issues

adding the toppings

pepperoni for the meat lovers

finished product(s)

Making the Crust:

Sprinkle yeast onto 1.5 cup of warm water.

In a bowl combine flour and salt. Then with a mixer (on low) mix in the olive oil.

Next pour in the water/yeast mixture and mix until combined (after this I ended up having to add some more flour because it was a little to soggy. If it sticks to your hands a lot when your kneading it, chances are you might need to add some flour).

Ok, now is the part where you wait...for 24 hours. Cover it with plastic wrap and stick it in the refrigerator. You can always wait longer (or even shorter, but that's when you have to get creative) if you prefer.

Making the Pizza:

First preheat the oven broiler.

Then, we cut up the eggplant (as thinly as you can) and tomatoes (length ways in half).

Place the eggplant into a strainer and sprinkle salt over it (make sure it's all coated) and let it sit for 20-30 minutes. Then rinse the eggplant off and put it along with the tomatoes on a cookie sheet, drizzled it with olive oil, add the minced garlic, and broil it. Do 3 minutes, then take it out, turn everything over, and do it for another 3 minutes on that side.

If you're good at multi tasking (or as in my case if you have help) you can simultaneously cut the onion, green pepper (both long ways) and the mushrooms (I bought the mushrooms pre-sliced...easier that way) and sautee them in a pan with some olive oil. I also added some Mrs. Dash spice to give it some flavor.

Pre-heat the oven to 500.

Then on a cookie sheet, spread out the dough (remember the crust makes two pizzas so divide it up and use two cookie sheets, or you can use some giant pan that probably exists somewhere out there but I don't own). Then add the sauce, and cheese on top (I just used HEB's Pizza cheese) and then the vegetables and pepperonis.

Bake for 10 - 12 minutes or until the crust is golden brown and then enjoy! We really loved it, especially us vegetable fans :)

Macaroni Casserole

Just to warn you, this is in no way, shape or form healthy and honestly there is probably no way to make it healthy. I did my best with using whole grain pasta and light sour cream but when you put this much cheese and butter into one dish, you just have to be prepared to not eat the next day to make up for it (or run it off, but not 30 minutes immediately following - more about that in the next post but let me just warn you it's a bad idea...). While it is not healthy it is one of the most delicious things you will ever eat and it's the way I was able to convince my roommates to all have dinner together.

Ingredients:

1 box of Kraft Macaroni (not the instant king but the kind you make on the stove) - you will also need the ingredients that go along with making this i.e. butter and milk

1 cup of sour cream

1 cup of cottage cheese

1 cup of (shredded) cheddar cheese

1 pkg. of ranch dressing mix

bread crumbs (optional) - and thanks to Sarah for the great idea :)

finishing up the macaroni

mixing everything together

baking

Pre-heat the oven to 350.

Then make the macaroni according to the box.

After that just mix the rest of the ingredients in with the macaroni.

Put it in a baking pan, sprinkle the bread crumbs on top and then put it into the oven to bake for 30 minutes.

Super easy but unfortunately I can't make it very often so that my roommates and I don't die a premature death...