Weekend Food: Turkey Burgers, Pizza, and Corn

Pizza makes a nice lunch on a Saturday afternoon, when you are trying to thank your husband for taking out the kiddos and granting you a much needed nap time! Oh, and lookie here - we got a pizza cutter!


Kevin says there's something about picking up a slice of pizza (instead of cutting into it) that makes it so much better...

My frozen dough is getting used and loved! Roasted corn and chicken pizza is a weekend treat!

I am not so great at "entertaining" at the last minute (i.e. having dinner guests without much planning), but I decided to try my hand at a super casual dinner for my sister, Debbie, and brother-in-law, Dan, on Saturday night. They were driving through CT, and I invited them over for burgers and corn. This Oriental Turkey Burger recipe was a snap to put together, and besides turkey meat, I had all the ingredients in the fridge. I thought these burgers were quite good - they had a nice hoisin, sweet and spicy flavor, without being too salty or overpowering. My main problem with this recipe, is that I followed it exactly, and found that it is really a recipe for "sliders" (mini-burgers), and not full sized burgers. This is no big deal, except for the fact that I bought standard burger rolls, and the burgers looked pretty tiny perched on those full sized buns! So... it wasn't a pretty meal, per se, but it was tasty, and served with corn, it made a nice, easy, quick summer meal.

My corn-lovin' little lady.

Tiny burger, big bun. I took about 15 photos of these burgers, by the way, and not a single one is in focus!

Debbie and Dan, care to comment on our burgers?


The Critique
My wife is the man. Well not really. But she's the man when it comes to making cheese-free pizzas. I don't know how she does it, but these rock my world. I love this pizza as much as I love soup. She got the crust right and thus, it gets 5 bowls.

Pizza, Take Two, and Sweet Tater Bread

In honor of the arrival of Shane, my big sister's baby, I made 2 sweet potato breads earlier this week. I made these, on a whim, last Thanksgiving, and they were a big hit. The thing is, no one loved the bread like Nora. She has been talking about it for a year, and has been asking me to make it right after her baby arrived. My recipe makes 2 standard loaves, so I decided to make one for her freezer, and one for Shane's bris, on Sunday. I love this recipe, because it's very easy, and I have most of the ingredients in my pantry already. In the past, I've used canned sweet potatoes (the organic, no sugar added kind), but I couldn't find them, so I mashed my own this time. You can also use pumpkin in these loaves. I don't think pumpkin has as interesting a flavor, but I love sweet potatoes, so I'm biased, I suppose.




We also made pizza again on Monday, as per Kevin's request. I doubled the dough this time, so now I have some frozen for future pizza making. I think these came out better this time, because the crust was thin and crispy, and I used fresh basil in the sauce. I also slightly roasted the veggies first, so they were well cooked after 10 minutes in the oven, on top of the pizza. I love pizza. I think we're going to have a once a week pizza night...
Marji's roasted vegetable and parm pizza.

Kevin's roasted chicken and vegetable cheese-less pizza.

Pizza Night!

Kevin is on call tonight, so I thought I'd try my hand at something "easy." We have made pizzas at home before, but today I decided to make my own whole wheat pizza dough, which I've never tried in the past (I usually buy it by the bag at the grocery store). I am so glad I made it myself, because it was much better than any of the dough I've purchased, and it was really easy to make early in the day, and use later on. I was even able to freeze a ball of dough for use later. Anyway, pizza is a hit in our house, because Kevin doesn't eat cheese, and I don't love meat, so I make individual roasted vegetable pizzas, and I put cheese on mine, and grilled chicken on Kevin's. I really liked these pizzas. I thought the dough rolled out nice and thin, and had a nice texture, and by baking them in the bottom of the oven at 500 degrees, the crust was crispy, but not overcooked. The vegetables roasted nicely, and you could barely see the dough underneath, for all the veggies on top. Even Maya liked it. She kept saying, "Put the chicken/bread/broccoli in my mouth - it's too sticky!" She didn't want to get messy hands, I guess. These were definitely fork and knife pizzas.

Kevin's Pizza: Grilled Chicken, broccoli, orange peppers, vidalia onions, mushrooms, and tomato sauce

Oh, and lots of roasted garlic.

Marji's Pizza: Most of the broccoli (I'm a broccoli hoarder, I admit it), peppers, onions, mushrooms, sauce, and CHEESE!!!

Our little pizzas at our little table.

Almost done eating, but a messy plate is a pretty plate!