Asparagus, Cheese, and Prosciutto Pizza

With a little help from Eat Live Run and Rachel Ray, we had a FANTASTIC pizza dinner.

I started by making a batch of Jenna’s “best” pizza dough. This recipe has been making the rounds of the blogosphere lately, and now I know why. *shout out to Jenna*

My Kitchen Aide mixer came down off the shelf for the occasion! This dough was incredibly easy to make and took no time at all. (I spent more time washing the dust off the mixer than I did making the dough!). We let it rise while we were out at the park.

When we got home, I split the dough into two balls. Froze one for later, and rolled the other out to fit a cookie sheet. Following this recipe that I had torn out of a RR magazine ages ago I put together the toppings quickly and easily.

Click the photo to read the recipe. I can’t find it on the RR website.

I kept checking on it because I was so worried my first pizza wouldn’t turn out. But it turned out exactly as shown in the picture! And tasted great too!! FH said “flavorful and delicious”. :) The crust was thin with crispy edges and a chewy bottom. The three cheeses made it creamy and gooey. And the asparagus and prosciutto added enough natural flavor that no extra herbs or spices were needed. Deeeeeeelish.

I ate three of the twelve pieces. :) I love square pizza pieces.

I am thinking “pizza Sunday” may have to be instituted around here.

A Walk in the Park

Not a cloud in the sky!!  Love it.

 

After a wander through the park, by the water, around the picnics and kids playing…we stopped for ice cream.  Yummmmmmm!

 

Pinky’s is one of those cool brazier style food stands.  They serve a wide variety of ice cream, plus fries, burgers, etc.  (I saw a sign for deeeeep friiiiied iiiiice creeeeeam…drool).  We will go back for lunch sometime when we’ve planned for it.

His ice cream: Brownies on the Moon topped with Peanut Butter Cookie Dough.  (The PB was creamy and awesome…with chunks of actual cookie dough).

Her ice cream: Polar Bear Paw (french vanilla ice cream with white chocolate caramel cups, chocolate almond bits, and caramel ribboned throughout).  Seriously the best ice cream I have had in forever!! 

After some more time in the sun, a nice drive through a neighborhood we’ve never visited (we like to see how the rich folks live!), and a couple of errands we returned home.  FH was in a hurry to get to the fridge.

While in the US he found his favorite childhood drink.  Since he hasn’t seen it in Canada in years, he brought us home a six-pack.

Tahiti Treat!     (Urban Dictionary definition is hysterical.)

I totally remember this stuff from when I was a kid.  What kid wouldn’t love fizzy fruit punch!!  FH is in nostalgia heaven!

Dandelion Love

It’s love/hate really. 

I’m loving the new weed removal tool I bought last week.

I’m hating having to use it a bazillion times.

When we got up this morning I made coffee for us and our overnight guests.  Due to too much booze last night, two folks declined the coffee…so more for me!  (yaya, I know I just said I’m supposed to be cutting back but I refuse to believe it’s an ulcer and I’m not in any pain…yet!)

For my breakfast (no one else was hungry…haha) I crumbled up one of my banana coconut oatmeal muffins and mixed it with a few scoops of Liberte coconut yogurt…deeeeelish.

 

After my big bucket of weeds were dug out (took about an hour and barely made a dent!) I ran to the store for yeast.  I grabbed one of the oatmeal chocolate chip bars on my way out the door.

Then I came in to prep the pizza dough for tonight’s dinner (stay tuned…you are gonna LOVE this!) and then made myself a little lunch to keep me going for our walk in the park.

Salad contains: mixed lettuces, matchstick carrots, cauliflower, orange pepper, chickpeas, raisins, and sunflower seeds.  Drizzled with grapeseed oil and s&p.  Served with Mary’s crackers.

I love raisins in salad!

Sunny Sunday!

Yaaaieeee!  As forecasted, the sun has appeared.  It’s already about 15+ out there and it’s supposed to get up to 21!  FH is running an errand while I putter in the yard (fighting those nasty dandelions!), then we are off for a waterside walk at Dingle Park!

Last night was great fun.  I put out too much food (as usual) but we didn’t eat dinner so the veggie platter was a good idea. 

I put out a few sweet treats too since I know our friend likes them and they had brought their daughter along too.  (Funny enough, she didn’t even look twice at the candy…what a kid!).

FH bought some new wine so I decided to have a couple of glasses.  I’ve put a slowdown on my drinking for the next few weeks because I still have that empty-hungry feeling going on and my Mom had a good thought that it may be the beginning of an ulcer.  If so, then alcohol and coffee need to be cut back (nooooooo, not coffee!!!).  I’ve been trying to get in to see my doctor to find out for sure, but so far I can’t get in.  I’ll try again on Monday.

Anyone have experience with a mild ulcer?

    

Our friends also brought a cake over which they won at their daughter’s school Fun Fair.  Does anyone else remember Cake Walks from elementary school?  This totally brought back memories of my best friend and I trying to make a fun cake on our own.  We baked a cake in an angle food pan, then stuck a Barbie in the middle to make it look like she was wearing a big, poofy dress.  Of course, we were like 10 years old and had no idea how to make icing.  We basically mixed milk and icing sugar…so Barbie’s dress was more “glazed” than “frosted”.  :)

This cake was just a white layer cake with Betty Crocker frosting and sprinkles…which had started to slide due to being moved around a lot.  But like we said, it doesn’t matter what cake looks like…it still tastes like cake!

OK, that’s enough computer on this SUNNY SUNDAY.  See you later!

Soggy Saturday

We woke up to continuing dismal weather.  Boooo.  Bring on Spring!  We want to get out in the yard and start getting a few things done (ooooooh, the joy of digging up dandelions!), but it’s tough to do when everything is soggy.  The forecast says tomorrow will be nice…we shall see!

So we enjoyed a leisurely morning sipping coffee.  FH has many PVR’d F1 races to catch up on so while he watched those I blogged from my laptop on the loveseat.  Funny how annoyed I was to buy this silly thing, but now I love having the second computer for using in the living room.  We are ridiculous really…we each have a desktop (mine in my office, his in his den) and now we both have laptops in the living room.  LOL.

The weather left me with the urge to bake.  Now that FH is home to share the baked goods I feel a little more like doing it.  When I’m here on my own, I tend to eat all of my wares!

First, yoga.  Sitting in the theatre last night wreaked havoc on my bad shoulder (which wasn’t bugging me much at all until that damn plane trip to and from Victoria) so I did a session of Yoga for Back Pain from yogadownload.com.  This series totally helps.  I can’t tell it’s helping while I’m doing it, but about an hour later my shoulder/neck/back feel amazing! 

Then lunch…no breakfast today.  I decided to make a smoothie (I’m working on an idea for a “smoothie week” next week!).  Today’s mix was my usual, but I added some PB2 for fun.  I won’t do it with particular mix again…the flavors didn’t jive for me. 

  

In the blender was:

1/2 ripe banana

4 frozen strawberries, slightly thawed

1 tbsp flax meal

1 tbsp PB2

3/4 cup light vanilla soy milk

1/4 cup water

Served up with a Nature’s Path waffle topped with almond butter and the other 1/2 of my banana sliced up.   

Now I was all limber and full, so it was time to bake.  I made a batch of Tina’s Oatmeal Raisin Bars…but instead of 1 cup of raisins, I subbed in a 1/2 cup of semi-sweet mini chocolate chips (FH doesn’t like raisins).  I also made a dozen of my Banana Oatmeal Muffins, but turned them into banana coconut oatmeal muffins by adding 1/2 cup sweetened coconut (I also dusted the tops with the coconut).

Baking puts me in a great mood!

Once everything was out of the oven and cooling, I headed off to the grocery store (again!).  Got a few snacks for this evening when our friends come over, plus the ingredients for a decadent pizza we plan to have for dinner tomorrow night (stay tuned!).  I forgot to get yeast for the pizza dough though so I’ll have to do that tomorrow when we do our errands.

Now it’s just a relaxing evening…we’ll do a bit of vacuuming and dusting before our guests come and I think I’ll have a fruity snack to tide me over (FH made himself a huge late lunch, so dinner on the menu today).  Considering the dismal weather, it’s turned out to be a lovely Saturday!