Vegan Pizza Wednesday

Sigh. It's the middle of the week... nothing is really exciting. Life is just plain old life.

WHY NOT MAKE PIZZA?!??!?!

So I did. And you can, too.

First and foremost, I gathered all of my ingredients. For this particular recipe, most of the ingredients I found at my neighborhood Safeway.

I used the following:

The French use a term called mise en place, which literally means "putting in place". I actually didn't learn this through Wikipedia; I learned this from being addicted to Food Network for an extended period of time while I was unemployed. Let's just say that cable TV can teach you a thing or two, and keep you occupied at the same time.

But back to mise en place - I can't tell you how useful it is as a cook, whether you are professional or not (and whether you are as OCD as I am or not) to literally have all your ingredients in place before you start cooking. It helps to have everything ready to grab once you start the actual cooking process, instead of constantly running back to the cupboards, or suddenly finding out you don't have an ingredient for the recipe you set out to make in the first place. I mean, ordering pizza is soooooo cliche...

Next Step:



Ready to pop in the oven on 450 for 10-12 minutes.
I turn the broiler on to melt the "cheese" for 5-7 minutes.



 

And the finished product... was gone in about five minutes. Matthew said it was quote "delicious" and "really, really good" and nodded and smiled throughout the entire five minutes he took to scarf it down. He also gave me lots of thumbs up, too, so I think that counts for something.

You can find more information about the pizza crusts I used here. I found them in the gluten-free section at Safeway in Queen Anne. The Vegan Gourmet cheese is the only certified vegan cheese I've found so far (it contains no casein whatsoever; casein is an animal derivative) and it even has a creamy texture on the pizza. It is available at Whole Foods or most health food stores and only keeps fresh for a few days; it is also expensive (4.99-5.99 for 5-6 servings.) It broils like cheese, too.

Thanks to this video, I was even able to chop an onion without crying!!! How about that for a Wednesday evening??

Have a good week everyone!