Darek + Stacie

OK, so arguably maybe this isn’t really a New recipe, since we’ve made pizza before – but never quite like this.

We’re trying to eat healthier this year. We don’t eat out much and we don’t eat a whole lot of bad stuff, but our weakness is definitely pizza. We’ve recently started using an online financial service called Mint (.com) that tracks our spending, and I nearly keeled over looking at the total amount spent on pizza.

Also, that Little Caesar’s and Papa John’s crap is just bad for you. Gross. Once in a while, maybe it’s ok, but every week…yuck. Plus, after a while it just tastes like crap.

My awesome friend Martha recently sent us a bread-maker (THANK YOU A MILLION TIMES!!) So we can easily make our own wheat pizza crust.

We’re working our way up to True Whole Wheat pizza crust, but in the meantime use this half wheat/half white recipe that’s very good: Amazing Whole Wheat Pizza Crust

We recently learned that it’s yummy to mix some herbs/spices and minced garlic with olive oil to spread on the dough before adding the other ingredients. Maybe this is common knowledge, but it’s changed our lives.

We also cook the crust on the baking stone for about 8 minutes before adding the toppings so it’s a crispier crust. And we halve the dough for a thin crust (and save the other half for pizza the next night….win-win-win).

We usually don’t put sauce on our pizza. This particular pizza was topped with mozzarella, parmesan, cooked chicken, broccoli, and sliced tomatoes.

And it was freaking amazing.

One of the best pizzas I’ve ever had.

And I’ve had a lot of pizzas.

Some of the ingredients:

And the finished product:

It’s on the menu for this Wednesday and Thursday.

We decided to make our own salsa, which we have somehow, surprisingly, never done before. Darek’s been taking cooking classes, including “Knife Basics,” so he knows how to cut up all the veggies all fast and stuff.

I poured some red wine vinegar into olive oil, and just as I was about to stir it I realized it was smiling at me:

Our new wonderful blender:

The finished product:

The verdict: It was pretty good, but way too mild. The recipe called for 5 slices of pickled jalapenos, but I used fresh ones and just guessed on the fresh to pickled substitution ratio and just used 3 fresh jalapenos, which was not nearly enough. Or maybe they were just super mild.

But otherwise, good stuff. Good texture, good flavor, and all of the ingredients were fresh. Mmmm.

You can find the recipe here: Garden Tomato Salsa

New recipes are back!!

This year, instead of trying one new recipe a week, I’m aiming for 52 new recipes this year.

Trust me, it’s easier.

We kicked off New Recipes ’09 with these yummy zucchini sticks.

I don’t really like zucchini, but it could grow on me…

We even made our OWN BREADCRUMBS with my awesome new chopper, since we didn’t have any on hand.

The recipe:

All ready to go in the oven:

All done!

I got the recipe out of a magazine, so I can’t link to it, but it was basically just sliced zucchini sticks covered in bread crumbs (which were mixed with parmesan cheese, Italian seasoning, egg whites, and salt). They go in the oven, come out, get dipped in marinara sauce, and are actually really good. Not cheese sticks, but a decent alternative. Yum for vegetables.

OK I LIED HERE IS THE RECIPE.

january 18: darek’s birthday, and sonic

january 19: not a good picture day….just took a picture of the picture by my desk (lazy!)

january 20: i wanted to take a picture relevant to the events of the day…but was too lazy to get anything good

january 21: love love love shooting with the macro lens

january 22: we got a new product to sell/offer – prints on masonite board and they are beautiful (this is the edge)

We did a puzzle:

Lera & Darek set the table:

They made fancy napkin/silverware things:

Velcro wants to help!

Then we played Cranium.

Me & Darek’s piece:

This is “The Devil Wears Prada”…Obviously…

Janaye is HILLARIOUS.

Can you guess what this is?

Or this?

And Velcro gets a pedicure:

And thus Danley Christmas 08 was wrapped up.