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Pizza Recipe: Green peppers, Tomatoes, Olives, Parmesan/Pecorino Romano Cheese, Grilled Chicken

One of the pizzas from Wendie’s surprise birthday party, this one has some grilled chicken (with a very nice spice blend including smoked paprika), two cheeses, olives, tomatoes, green peppers and onions. The dough is a pizza dough with honey I sort-of invented (based loosely on our Lavash crackers recipe), and the tomato sauce has a wide range of spices, most noticeably a hint of fennel.  We had 13 guests and I made a total of 9 pizzas and I was stunned that there were almost no leftovers. I really had expects to fill the freezer too, but at least everyone had a great time. Next time I’ll make more!

Pizza: Green peppers, Tomatoes, Olives, Parmasan/Pecorino Romano Cheese, Grilled Chicken

Pizza: Green peppers, Tomatoes, Olives, Parmesan/Pecorino Romano Cheese, Grilled Chicken

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Black Forest Ham Sandwich With Goat/Roquefort Melt And Parmesan

Saturday: Wake up. Shower. Get Dressed. Breakfast now, NO, kitchen remodel. Drink milk, drive to Escondido. Get mulch and rosebushes, look at avocado tree. Back, unload, Costco. Gas, Bank, Home. Hungry, NO, kitchen remodel! What to do? This. Simple, good, easy, fast, out the door again…

Black Forest Ham Sandwich With Goat/Roquefort Melt And Parmesan

Black Forest Ham Sandwich With Goat/Roquefort Melt And Parmesan

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Chicken Salad Sandwich On Sourdough Bread With Anis Tomato Sauce, Fried Onions And Pepitas Seeds

Leftover chicken is fantastic. Carefully pick all the little pieces of meat off, and make yourself a nice chicken salad. It’s very easy and simple, and we quite frankly look forward to the day after the roast as much as the roast itself. We have fallen in love with pepitas seeds (aka pumpkin seeds): These seeds are fantastic on sandwiches, as they provide some ‘crunch’ and taste great on top. We find them to be very under-utilized and the next experiment will be to try them on pizzas. We already know they work wonders on Lavash crackers. Posting this recipe makes us long to have a kitchen again, as currently everything we have is torn out and dumped. Over the next four weeks, we hope our fantastic contractor will be done building it back up, with lovely Calacutta marble counter tops and custom cabinets. Ahhh dreams…

Chicken Salad Sandwich On SourDough With Anis Tomato Sauce, Fried Onions And Pepitos Seeds

Chicken Salad Sandwich On SourDough With Anis Tomato Sauce, Fried Onions And Pepitos Seeds

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Recipe: Smoked Salmon Pizza With Sautéed Garlic Mushrooms, Tomato Sauce, Jarlsberg Cheese, Fresh Basil And Avocado

Recently we discovered the joy of smoked salmon on pizzas, and decided to try another one. This is our second pizza from Wendie’s surprise birthday party (of nine total), and also a very popular one amongst our friends. It’s simple in its ingredients, with very subtle tastes. The Sautéed mushroom worked great on the pizza (We used it a few times that night), and on this the avocado brings a coolness to the hot pizza that almost melts with the salmon.

Smoked Salmon Pizza With Sautéed Garlic Mushrooms, Tomato Sauce, Avocado, Jarlsberg Cheese And Fresh Basil

Smoked Salmon Pizza With Sautéed Garlic Mushrooms, Tomato Sauce, Avocado, Jarlsberg Cheese And Fresh Basil

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Pizza Dough With Honey

Pizza Dough With Honey Recipe

Total time: 2 hours (including rising).

Will make enough dough for 4 pizzas.  The remaining dough can be frozen until your next pizza craving demands satisfaction. This is a variation of the basic pizza dough in that we have added honey and a little more yeast and salt. This makes the dough just a little sweet, and more tasty, which can be a fun variation when making homemade pizzas. …Continue reading Pizza Dough With Honey

Alton Brown’s ‘Who Loves Ya Baby-Back Ribs’ Pizza

After a night of excess featuring Alton Brown’s “Who Loves Ya Baby-Back?” ribs, we were lucky enough to have a few leftover. Neither myself nor Wendie have ever has a rib-pizza, so we thought we would give it a try. We cleaned the meat of the ribs, and basically used it as one of the ingredients. This pizza was one of 9 we made for Wendie’s 39 years birthday (Surprise!!). That was the last big cooking day in the old kitchen (notice the brown tiles – all gone now), and one day we can’t wait to reconstruct in the new kitchen when it’s ready in a few weeks. For now we will struggle on without a kitchen, dust all over, and a hole in the floor where the drain will connect our island to the ‘mainland.’ Sigh, life’s hard with no kitchen.

Alton Brown's "Who Loves Ya Baby-Back Ribs" Pizza

Alton Brown's "Who Loves Ya Baby-Back Ribs" Pizza

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Corned Beef Burger with Mayo-less Coleslaw

Just for fun, we thought we would ask if Costco would publish one of our sandwiches. That was in November 2009.  Imagine our excitement when they said yes! So, due to their long production time, we were scheduled for the March issue of the Costco Connection magazine. The editor asked us if perhaps we could make a St. Patrick’s day inspired sandwich, with corned beef. Of course we could, and with a deadline of mid-january, our Christmas consisted of making several corned-beef adventures since none of us have ever really used it (turns out corned beef is quite tasty). Of our many corned beef sandwiches (some of which we have published already here), we had two favorites:

The winner was this one, a delicious burger with a side of mayo-less coleslaw. Costco unfortunately ran out of space, so the coleslaw couldn’t make it in the magazine. This is, however, the entire recipe. Let us know what you think.

Corned Beef Burger with Mayo-less Coleslaw

Corned Beef Burger with Mayo-less Coleslaw

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Ciabatta Falafel Sandwich with Roquefort, Red Pepper And Paprika And Roasted Garlic Dressing

Well our kitchen remodel is under way now, and today our old kitchen was reduced to rubble, and placed in a giant container outside the house. We are very excited to get the new one in about 4-6 weeks, and before the demilition began we had the sanity to make a few sandwiches and pizzas to keep things interesting while we await perfection. This weekend we shall attempt some sandwiches made entirely on our BBQ, and look forward to being creating. Until then, this is a little gem we made last week, falafel (great for sandwiches), with a nice homemade yogurt dressing. We hope you enjoy it.

Ciabatta Falafel Sandwich with Red Pepper And Paprika And Roasted Garlic Dressing

Ciabatta Falafel Sandwich with Red Pepper And Paprika And Roasted Garlic Dressing

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Burger with Roasted Garlic Mayo and Caramelized Onions

This burger looks quite simple, but the onions make it very moist and delicious while the roasted garlic gives it a great taste. This is definitely one of our favorite burgers so far. In the next few weeks our kitchen is being renovated, and we’re not sure how we can keep up our frantic sandwich making pace. We will have access to an outdoor BBQ with a side stove, and… restaurants. Idea for BBQ sandwiches/burgers that can be easily prepared with no kitchen would be highly appreciated :-)

Burger with Roasted Garlic Mayo and Caramelized Onions

Burger with Roasted Garlic Mayo and Caramelized Onions

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Chicken Salad Sandwich with Beet Root

Beets are, at least here in SoCal (Southern California) a much ignored root. I’ve heard countless locals sneer at the very mention of it, claiming it taste like soil, and wondering what in the world such a thing could be good for. Well, dear neighbors, here is a sandwich that the beet is perfect for. Make your own chicken salad, and cut a slice of pickled beet root on top, and it’s just fantastic. It add lots of color to an otherwise drab sandwich. By the way, we highly recommend not buying the pre-made cardboard chicken salads in the grocery store, when it’s so easy and cheap to make. It also tastes a lot better by the way. Interestingly, I have no recollection of my mother ever making any such thing, and the first time I even remember having a ‘chicken salad’ is buying one in a grocery store after moving to a dorm in college. I wonder what my mom did with all those chicken leftovers, come to think of it?

Chicken Salad Sandwich with Beets

Chicken Salad Sandwich with Beets

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Tarragon Salad Dressing

Salad dressing, you say, how does that have anything to do with sandwiches? Well, one of our culinary experiments resulted in a delicious ham sandwich using this dressing as a spread.  Anders loves tarragon. I mean, he really loves it. In our love of gardening, we’ve made many attempts at growing this delightful herb but to no avail. As I write this, there is a plant languishing on our patio in complete defiance of all the love, attention and desperate hope that has been directed at.  But I digress. Lucky for us, we live close to a neighborhood grocery that sells fresh tarragon when in season, and when not, they sell huge bags of the dried stuff.   And when life gives you tarragon, why not make a tarragon salad dressing?

So here’s the recipe:

  • 1/4 cup olive oil
  • 1/4 cup white balsamic vinegar
  • 1 tsp whole grain mustard
  • 2 cloves garlic, minced
  • 2 tsp dried tarragon
  • 1 tbs honey (or to taste)
  • kosher salt
  • fresh pepper

In a small bowl, combine vinegar, mustard, garlic and tarragon.  Mix well and taste. Depending on how well aged your balsamic vinegar is, you might not need the honey. The one we use is on the lower side of the price point and so does need a little help to soften the flavor.  Add honey, if needed.  Slowly drizzle in the olive oil, whisking continuously. That’s it. We’ve make this dressing quite a lot and find that as good as it is freshly made, it tastes even better the next day after the tarragon has a better chance to infuse the dressing with its flavor. It works great as a dressing, tossed with boiled/baked new spring potatoes, grilled veggies and so many more.

But since this is a sandwich blog after all, the sandwich incarnation can be found here in this “Pepper Ham Sandwich With Tarragon Salad Dressing, Cheese, Roasted Garlic And Smoked Paprika.

Sun-Dried Tomato and Basil Hummus Recipe

It’s easy to buy hummus in a store, but it’s almost as easy to make it, and much more fun. This is a call to action; stop buying hummus!

All it takes to make are chickpeas, lemon juice, olive oil, tahini and garlic. Plus, add sun-dried tomatoes and you have sun dried tomato hummus. We use fresh cilantro or parsley as a topping, with a few roasted pine nuts, and you got yourself a really affordable and amazing appetizer dip. Naturally, we will be using some of this on our upcoming sandwiches :-) .

Hummus with Sun Dried Tomatoes, Parsley and Roasted Pine Nuts

Hummus with Sun Dried Tomatoes, Parsley and Roasted Pine Nuts

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Sautéed Zucchini with Garlic and Lemon

This being winter, we thought we would provide a recipe for a summer garden favorite. And no, we do not find anything incongruous about this. What better time to start dreaming about the goodies of summer than now when the cold seems interminable. Okay, so as people lucky enough to live in San Diego which is as close to weather perfection as it ever gets in the US, we do not really experience winter – at least not of the snowmageddon variety.  Anyway, one of the veggies that will reward you with copious production is the zucchini. Two plants can produce enough for a family of four for the growing season. With our limited space, we’ve regretfully stayed away from it. Our rationale – we have a well stocked market within 2 minutes walk of our house and it’s pretty hard to give up tomato space.   So since we love zucchini but don’t always have it growing in the garden, we are so happy to be able to purchase was needed.

This little side dish is so simple, tasty and healthy. It is just bursting with flavor that we almost want to do a little dance as we eat it. Yes, it is that good.

Lime Squash Sauteed in Olive Oil and Garlic with Parmesan

Lime Squash Sauteed in Olive Oil and Garlic with Parmesan

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Pepper Ham Sandwich With Tarragon Salad Dressing, Cheese, Roasted Garlic And Smoked Paprika

One of our crazy experiments finally paid off. The addition of the salad dressing to this bread takes this simple sandwich to a whole new level. The bread, after toasting, is moist but yet crunchy. The dressing adds a ‘zing‘ to the ham. This sandwich reminds us of Woodstock: a mixed bag of nuts making sweet music together. Feel the love, add the dressing!

Pepper Ham Sandwich With Salad Dressing, Cheese, Roasted Garlic And Smoked Paprika

Pepper Ham Sandwich With Salad Dressing, Cheese, Roasted Garlic And Smoked Paprika

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Roasted Duck Sandwich with Valdeon Cheese, Cranberry Relish And Green Pepper

Roasted duck is a great treat, although the price for a duck in Poway is ridiculous. This is a sandwich we forgot to post dating all the way back to Christmas 2009. The cranberry relish was homemade, and just went perfect with the Spanish Valdeon cheese and the duck. For all you kids out there, it is very likely this was in fact Donald Duck. We’re sorry, we really are, we just couldn’t help ourselves (he was delicious).

Roasted Duck Sandwich with Valdeon Cheese, Cranberry Relish And Green Pepper

Roasted Duck Sandwich with Valdeon Cheese, Cranberry Relish And Green Pepper

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