Homemade Zucchini Crust Pizza

What you'll need:

4 zucchinis, depending on their size, about four cups when grated

1/4-1/2 cup salt

3 eggs

5 oz. asiago cheese

5 oz. parmesan cheese

fresh parsley

fresh cilantro

4 cloves of garlic, minced

oregano (I didn't have it fresh so I just used the dried seasoning)

1 can of pizza sauce

fresh mozzarella

1 yellow squash

preheat oven to 400 degrees

Start out by grating all of your zucchini into a bowl and sprinkling it generously with salt to pull the juices out. I found a huge zucchini at my local farmer's market in Madison, so I only needed one! 

Place your salted zucchini in a strainer and let it sit for about 15 min. Periodically, you can squeeze out the juice with your hands or by pushing the zucchini against the side of the strainer. It's important to get as much moisture out as possible!

While your zucchini is sitting, go ahead and mince your garlic and finely chop the parsley and cilantro!

The next step is to crack 3 eggs into a large bowl and whisk them together until fluffy. You can then add your zucchini, garlic, parsley and cilantro. If you have fresh oregano, you can add that too, otherwise sprinkling some of the dried version will work just fine.

Then, add some of your parmesan and asiago cheese to the mixture. It doesn't have to be exact, I would say about 2 oz of each. Just make sure you have enough left to put on top of the pizza later on!

If your mixture is looking at all watery you might want to try and drain some of the excess liquid out of the side of the bowl. Then, the zucchini mixture is ready to be spread into a well greased 12 in. pizza pan. Make sure there is a uniform thickness when you are spreading it out. Feel free to sprinkle some salt and pepper on top. 

Pop the crust in the oven at 400 degrees for about 20 min, but check it periodically to make sure it is browning evenly on all sides. 

While your crust is cooking you can go ahead and slice your yellow squash. The slices should be pretty thin.

Place the squash slices in a single layer in a pan with hot olive oil. Allow them to turn slightly golden brown on each side and then remove them from the heat. Once all of your slices are cooked, set them aside for later use.

Your pizza crust is done cooking when it starts to turn golden brown on top. However, it won't necessarily be "crispy," so it's easiest to just eat your finished pizza with a fork.

Next, open your can of pizza sauce and spread it evenly over your crust. Sprinkle some of your asiago and parmesan cheese on top.

On top of that, lay out slices of your fresh mozzarella cheese and squash. 

Finally, top with the remainder of the asiago and parmesan as well as some fresh chopped parsley.

Place the pizza back in the oven for another 8-10 min to allow everything to melt together.

Then, take out and enjoy! 

Oven Baked Apples with Coconut, Maple Syrup, and Lime

I saw this on an old episode of TLC's Take Home Chef and it sounded so unique that I had to try it out! Here's what you'll need:

1/2 c sugar
1/4 c lime juice (2 limes, fresh is better!)
2/3 c butter
1/2 c maple syrup
2 c coconut
4 Granny Smith Apples
Preheat oven to 400 degrees F

The first thing is to add your sugar to a pan over medium heat and let it melt. Be careful not to get your pan too hot or the sugar will burn and you'll be left with a big brown clump that will harden like a rock and become impossible to clean! not speaking from personal experience or anything...After the sugar is melted, stir in your fresh lime juice followed by your butter and maple syrup. It should be smelling fantastic right about now. Allow the mixture to thicken a bit and then add your coconut. If it still seems a bit watery you can throw more coconut in. Remove the pan from the heat and let it cool for a bit.

Now the challenging part, you need to cut each apple into 4 pieces using horizontal cuts. You should be able to stack the slices back on top of each other when you're done. If you're struggling to cut four pieces, three will work fine, more layers just look more impressive. After you have your apples cut, you need to take out the core from the middle layers. Ultimately, you should have an apple bottom, two apple rings, and an apple top.

Once your apples are all cut it's time to add your coconut mixture and get stacking. Set your apple bottom on a piece of aluminum foil (big enough to wrap the whole apple in when you're done) and spoon some of the coconut mixture on. Place your first coconut ring on top and repeat the process again. It should look something like this.

Keep alternating coconut and apple, ending with your apple top.

Afterwards, just wrap them up good and tight with aluminum foil and they're ready for the oven! It might  not be a bad idea to wrap them in two sheets of foil, just to make sure none of those juices leak out all over your oven. You can either place your wrapped up apples on a pan or right on the oven rack.

If your oven is preheated and ready, just pop them in and let them cook at 400 degrees F for about 25 minutes. If you don't think they're soft enough after the 25 min feel free to leave them in a bit longer, it definitely won't hurt them!
After you take them out of the oven, be sure to be careful unwrapping them from the foil. The bottoms will be filled with juices and it could easily turn into a huge mess!

If you're going for the gold star in culinary presentation, you can try transferring your apples to plates while still stacked, but I promise it will still taste good if it falls over. You can also take some of the extra juices from the bottom of the foil and drizzle them over the top. These are super sweet, but so delicious!

Crab Fettuccine Alfredo

1c 1% Milk
1/4c Butter
2 cloves of garlic
1/8 tbs pepper
1 pkg Imitation Crab
1c 1% Milk *
1/2 c Parmesan Cheese *
Fettuccine Noodles

*I found myself adding a little more milk and cheese to give the sauce more of a liquid consistency, don't be afraid to play around with the recipe and quantities!

It's probably a good idea to get your water boiling for your noodles first, I forgot to do this and had to leave my crab Alfredo sauce cooling while the noodles finished cooking. Not a big deal, but the timing definitely could have been better! Now that you have that started...

Mince the garlic and then add it to a large saute pan along with the butter. Allow the garlic to sauté in the butter for a couple minutes before adding the pepper, crab, and milk. It's honestly a waste of a measuring spoon to make sure you add exactly 1/8 tbs of pepper, approximating is fine. You can always add more later. Shredding the chunks of crab before adding them to the skillet will also save you the effort of trying to break them up with a wooden spoon in the pan. After you have combined all of the ingredients EXCEPT the cheese, allow everything to simmer for about three minutes.

















Then you can add your parmesan cheese. Again, don't be afraid to adapt to your personal preferences by adding more than 1/2c. There will be a lot of crab meat in the sauce and you want the Alfredo taste to still stand out!

After the cheese is all melted in your next step is to add the cooked noodles. I was able to add them right on top of my sauce and mix everything together in the pan, but if you don't have enough room try a big bowl. Be careful though, everything will be hot!

Once it's all combined, sprinkle a little more parmesan cheese on top, if you want, and enjoy.

The Beginning

This is my first attempt at a blog. I have no idea how long it will last. The idea is to simply post anything that falls into the broad category of "my life." I'll try to update as often as possible. My optimistic idealist side wants me to promise daily, but we'll see. My worldly travels haven't started just yet, so I can't guarantee anything thrilling or exciting. I am simply a UW-Madison student who loves cooking, taking pictures, and experiencing all of the simple beauties life has to offer.