Jan 24, 2010 Posted by Lisa Milone on Jan 24, 2010 | 8 comments

Hungry For Pizza?

Happy work week eve everyone. This weekend passed by a little too quickly for me. Was it like that for anyone else? I did experiment with a few different recipes and I’m pretty excited to share them with you this week. One of them involves chocolate – my favorite ingredient, of course.

There has been a giant rain cloud hovering over Nashville for days now. I love winter but I have to admit… this cold, dreary weather has left me longing for sunny, happy weather. For now, I’ll just throw a recipe into the mix that is the best summertime meal. It’s pretty much a classic meal, so it could most likely be the right choice for a Super Bowl party too. You can’t go wrong with a delicious homemade pizza and an ice-cold beer. You heard that right – both of these things are gluten-free. Keep reading, you will be happy to hear that gluten-free pizza AND beer exists.

Ingredients:
1 ½ cups Namaste Pizza Crust Mix
1 ¼ cups water
1 tsp olive oil (plus oil to coat the pan)

Heat oven to 450° F. Place oven rack at lowest position. Coat a large pizza pan (I used a large baking sheet) with oil or non-stick spray.

Combine 1 ½ cups pizza crust mix with 1 teaspoon oil and 1 ¼ cups water. Beat with an electric mixer for 3 minutes. Batter will be the consistency of cake batter.

Scrape batter onto pizza pan and spread with spatula. It is VERY important to spread batter to at least 14 inches.

Bake for approximately 20 minutes on lowest rack. Pull the crust out and add sauce and toppings.

I used a gluten-free pizza sauce and topped the pizza with goat mozzarella, shredded chicken, two chopped roma tomatoes, a small can of black olive slices, and some spinach. Bake an additional 10-15 minutes.

Slice and enjoy! The gluten-free beer I served with this is made from sorghum. Redbridge can be found in most grocery stores. Click here to read more about it on their website.

Jan 19, 2010 Posted by Lisa Milone on Jan 19, 2010 | 2 comments

Spice-Rubbed Roasted Salmon with Lemon-Garlic Spinach

I always get really nervous when I cook for a group of people. I’m really not sure why but I think it’s a combination of things – keeping all of the food warm enough until it’s exactly the right time to serve, hoping the meal will be impressive enough, worrying someone will absolutely despise one of the ingredients I decided to use, and so on and so on. I can say that without a doubt, this recipe is PERFECT for impressing guests. It’s simple, quick, and quite spectacular tasting.

The recipe came from Cooking Light. I changed a few of the ingredient measurements, and have one comment about the lemon-garlic spinach. If you aren’t one to like lemon-y things, just eliminate the lemon zest and juice from the spinach to better fit your liking. It still tastes wonderful without the lemon.

I hope you enjoy this as much as I did! I was very impressed with how this recipe turned out.

SALMON
Ingredients:
1 tsp salt
1 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp ground coriander
1 tsp paprika
1/4 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp freshly ground black pepper
2 skinless salmon fillets
1 sliced onion
Olive oil to coat dish

SPINACH
Ingredients:
1 tsp olive oil
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 (10-ounce) package fresh baby spinach
1 tsp grated lemon rind
1/4 tsp salt
1 tsp fresh lemon juice

Remaining Ingredients:
2 tablespoons chopped fresh cilantro

Preheat oven to 400°.

To prepare salmon, combine first 6 ingredients; rub spice mixture evenly over fish. Place onion in an 11 x 7-inch baking dish coated with olive oil. Place fish on top of onion; bake at 400° for 20 minutes or until fish flakes easily when tested with a fork or until desired degree of doneness.

To prepare spinach, heat oil in a large nonstick skillet over medium heat. Add garlic to pan; cook 1 minute. Add half of spinach; cook for 1 minute, stirring frequently. Add remaining spinach; cook 4 minutes or until wilted, stirring frequently. Sprinkle spinach mixture with rind and 1/4 teaspoon salt. Stir in juice; remove from heat.

Place salmon on a platter. Arrange onions and spinach evenly around salmon. Sprinkle salmon with chopped fresh cilantro. Serve with lemon wedges, if desired.