The Cook & The Coach Blog

Simple Homemade Pizza Sauce

6/28/2017

Pizza... everybody loves it! Even those of us that are living a healthier life love to indulge in it. It's actually one reason why I bought the domain, www.healthierpizza.com. Don't try heading over there yet, at this point it is just an idea in my head. The idea came to me because a healthy life shouldn't be one that is absent of pizza.

Upgrading some of the ingredients is the place to start. We have other posts on upgrading the crusts with whole wheat flour or using cauliflower. We have a fun recipe where we eliminate dairy and add some extra veggies with this Thai pizza. We even love the pizza so much we incorporated the flavors into this lentil dish.

With all of these, I had yet to create a delicious and healthier option for one of the most basic components, a good red sauce. Last night while Laura was away, Eli and I decided to make some pizzas. We tried out a new premade gluten free crust from Mikey's. The crust is made from paleo friendly ingredients and was pretty tasty! We topped that with a homemade red sauce that took 2 minutes to mix up then just a little time to simmer on the stove.

Check it out and let us know what you think. If you end up tweaking it feel free to comment below with what you did. This is one thing I'm always playing around with and improving.

Ingredients

1 Can of Organic Tomato Sauce
1 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp dry basil
2 tsp dry oregano
1/2 tsp fennel seed
Salt and Pepper

Directions

Add all the ingredients to a small sauce pan and simmer covered for a minimum of 10 minutes, up to an hour for more flavor.

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Pizza Lentils

10/29/2015

If I could eat pizza for every meal I'm pretty sure I would. It's just straight delicious. Now that I can no longer indulge in your standard gluten containing pizza crust I need to get creative in order to get my pizza consumption. I've tried cauliflower crust. I used to make my own dough with standard whole wheat flour and have since found a GF flour that works with that same recipe. I even just bought the domain, www.healthierpizza.com knowing that someday I will dedicate an entire site to pizza. So yeah I love it.

The problem with pizza and a being healthy is they don't exactly go hand in hand. It's usually pretty fatty and pretty carb heavy which is a bad combo if your goal is stay or get trim. This "version" of pizza was a random throw together that I did the other night and it turned out pretty good. I will say with the protein and fiber from the lentils this dish fares on the healthier side too.
In the dish I used a homemade pizza sauce. I have to apologize in that I have no idea what I added to it. I think I just googled "homemade pizza sauce" and semi followed a recipe. It's super simple especially if you start with a tomato sauce and not whole tomatoes. If you want to get really ambitious go for the whole tomatoes it will be worth it. Also the longer you can let it simmer the better but in a pinch 10 minutes will do. Just try to avoid adding sugar, there's no need!

I should also mention that I did this in our new Fagor pressure cooker. We love this addition to our kitchen and use it all the time for all sorts of dishes and foods. This could easily be done in a saucepan or deep skillet. I was able to saute in this then just add the lid and set the timer and walk away. Pretty slick!

One of the beauties of pizza is that you can pretty much make it however you want. My favorite combo is pepperoni, sausage, and mushrooms so I got as close to that as I could with the ingredients I had on hand, minus the mushrooms. Feel free to add whatever you like on your pizza to make this your own. Hope you enjoy!!!

Ingredients

1 tbsp olive oil
1 onion diced
1 tbsp minced garlic
2 chicken sausage, chopped
1/2 cup pepperoni, chopped
1 cup lentils
1/2 cup pizza sauce, I might use more next time! I'm a sauce guy
1 1/2 cups water or broth
1/2 cup shredded cheese, pick your favorite. We used parmigiano reggiano
Fresh herbs (Basil or Oregano) for garnish

Directions

Over medium heat, add your olive oil to the pot and add onions and garlic. Cook for 3-4 minutes until slightly translucent.
Add the sausage and pepperoni and cook for another 5 minutes.
Add remaining ingredients and bring to a boil if you are cooking on your stove top. Once boiling reduce to low and simmer for 20 minutes or until lentils are cooked through and most the liquid is absorbed.
Top with cheese and herbs and serve.

*A variation if you aren't looking for a GF dish would be to transfer to a baking dish after lentils are cooked, top with cheese and then top with some Italian bread crumbs.

Sweet Potato and Cauliflower Crust Pizza

4/13/2015

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So this week was an experiment for me on our quest to make a new meal for a Monday post. We've tried cauliflower crust pizzas in the past and really haven't had any luck with flavor or texture. We love the idea of pizza that we can eat without any guilt so we wanted to give it another try.

So this time I thought it would be fun and tasty to add sweet potato to the cauliflower. This would give it a bit of that sweet flavor that you get from regular dough when you add honey or sugar. I was also hoping it would help crisp up the crust a bit more.

If you can't tell by words like "experiment" and "hoping" this didn't quite turn out the way I had hoped. Although tasty it didn't quite have the texture that I was hoping. The outside got crispy but the interior stayed a little on the soft side. It was definitely a fork kind of pizza.

Feel free to make some suggestions if there are any bakers out there that know a way to add more of crunch and firmer texture. I'm thinking maybe a little more tapioca starch and a higher heat when I bake it next time.

Ingredients

Crust Ingredients

1 head of cauliflower, chopped and processed in a food processor
1 medium sweet potato, baked and mashed
1 egg
1/2 cup tapioca starch
1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
1 tsp dried basil
1 tsp dried oregano
1 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp cracked black pepper

Toppings

1/2 cup prepared pesto
1/2 lb shrimp
1 tbsp garlic, finely chopped
Tomato, diced or sliced
1 cup cheese of your choice, we used a gouda goat cheese

Directions

Preheat oven to 400 degrees (I originally started baking at 350 and it was taking forever, so I upped it to 400 mid-bake).
Chop the cauliflower into smaller pieces and place in a food processor. You will likely need to do this in 2-3 batches to get smaller grind on the cauliflower.
Place processed cauliflower on a kitchen towel and ring out as much liquid as possible.
You will need to mix all the ingredients together, I used a stand mixer, you could re-add them to the food processor, or do it by hand in a mixing bowl, your choice.
Transfer your ingredients to parchment lined baking sheet and spread into whatever shape pizza you want. The recipe will likely give you two medium pizzas worth of crust.
Bake at 400 degrees for roughly 30 minutes until the edges start to turn golden brown.
In a skillet cook your shrimp and garlic prior to putting on top of the pizza.
Remove from the oven, add your toppings, and continue to bake for another 10-15 minutes.

Once I master this crust I will post the recipe cards that you guys can download. Until then I would appreciate any feedback on how I could improve this recipe and process.

Make it a Great Monday!

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Thai Pizza with Peanut Sauce, Shrimp, Carrots and Broccoli

12/8/2014

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I have to apologize for not posting too many recipes as of late. We've been doing a lot of super simple stuff like roasting fish and veggies with salt and pepper. I didn't think that you need help doing that. If you do, then I'm happy to help and feel free to shoot us a message.

We made this Saturday night, I was really craving pizza after my brother stopped by and mentioned he was on his way to go pick up a pizza from a local pizza place. My normal go to pizza is pepperoni, sausage and mushrooms, LOVE IT!!! Laura likes her pesto, shrimp with goat cheese combination. I don't want to say we met in the middle with this one, but maybe... It had Laura's shrimp and it had some spice that I like in my pizza. All in all this pizza took maybe 45 minutes to make the dough from scratch, prep the toppings and then bake. So yeah a little bit longer than a frozen pizza but so much better for you and just as fast a it would take to have a pizza delivered.

Ingredients

Pizza Dough - This is a modification from the other dough recipe we posted earlier this year. The other one is completely whole wheat flour. If you want that recipe you click here.

2/3 cup whole wheat flour
2/3 cup all purpose flour
1/2 cup water, heated to 110 degrees
2 tsp honey
2 tsp olive oil
1 tsp instant yeast
1/2 tsp salt
2 tbsp Parmesan cheese (optional)

Peanut Sauce - This peanut sauce could be used for anything a marinade for chicken to a dipping sauce for spring rolls.

1/4 cup natural creamy peanut butter
1/4 cup water or stock
2 tbsp Liquid Aminos or low sodium soy sauce
1 tbsp Chili Garlic Sauce
1 tsp Sriracha - feel free to adjust depending on how spicy you like things
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1/2 tsp garlic powder

Toppings

1 cup steamed broccoli, chopped into bite size pieces
1/2 cup shredded carrots, raw
1 cup cooked shrimp, cut into bite size pieces
1/4 cup green onions, finely chopped

Directions

Pizza Dough

Mix the water, honey, oil, yeast together to dissolve the honey and also allow the yeast to activate. Let rest for 5 minutes. You should see the yeast at work. I did this right in my stand mixer.
Mix together your dry ingredients in a separate bowl.
Using the dough hook attachment on your mixer, turn it on at a low speed. Slowly begin adding your dry ingredients a little at a time. Once all the dry ingredients are added your dough ball should start climbing up the side of the bowl, when this happens you can stop. If you do not have a stand mixer, knead the dough for 2 minutes by hand.
Cover the dough and let rest for 20 minutes.
After 20 minutes remove the dough. Place on a lightly flour dusted countertop.
Roll out into a 6″ circle with your hands trying to keep it as round as possible. At this point I switched to a rolling pin because my pizza tossing and hand pressing skills are not that good. I rolled it out to about a 1/4″ thick and it was roughly 12″ across.

Peanut Sauce

Combine all the ingredients in a small saucepan and warm over medium heat until peanut butter melts. After everything comes together, keep on lowest heat setting until ready to use.

Assembly

Preheat your oven to 450 degrees. If you using a pizza stone, keep your stone in the oven while you are preheating.
Once your stone and oven are hot, remove stone from the oven. A trick to keep your dough from sticking to your stone is to sprinkle a little bit of corn meal on the stone before putting your dough on it. After that, put your dough on the stone. Brush on a little olive oil. Using a fork pierce the top of the dough in order to keep it from bubbling up while it bakes.
Put the dough in the oven for 5 minutes WITHOUT any toppings. It should be slightly brown.
Remove from the oven, add your sauce evenly on the dough, then add your toppings. Bake for another 6 minutes or until your crust begins brown and crisp up.
Cut and ENJOY!!!

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Simple Homemade Pizza Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Pizza Lentils

Ingredients

Directions

Sweet Potato and Cauliflower Crust Pizza

Ingredients

Directions

Thai Pizza with Peanut Sauce, Shrimp, Carrots and Broccoli

Ingredients

Directions