Some friends gave me Novella Carpenter’s book Farm City: The Education of an Urban Farmer. As a fellow Oaklander with a tiny garden who is always thinking about getting chickens, they thought I would be interested. I am. The book is about a women in Oakland who lives in the heart of the city and tends to a large garden and raises animals for meat.

The book is inspiring because it shows you can figure out a way to do just about anything if you want to. Novella loves the sustainable part of a farmer’s life but not the solitude so she figured out a way to have a small farm in a city.  She raises two large pigs that she feeds from dumpsters  and gardens on a vacant lot next door. She is able to do all this because she lives in one of the more economically depressed sections of Oakland and there are so many bigger problems then a couple pigs walking down the street.

Watch a video of an interview with her or poke around her website and get inspired too. What is that thing you have always wanted to do but only see the roadblocks? Perhaps it is time to dust off those old dreams.

Making pizza together can be lots of fun. The chef at Indulge Catering took some of Mom’s Pizza Dough with her when she went to hang out with her two nieces. They had a blast making pizza for dinner. So much so that they are going to make it a monthly get together. Next month’s menu will feature cheeseburger pizza.

Let me know what you do with Mom’s Pizza Dough.

Celebrate Oktoberfest with beer and Oktoberfest pizza. This pizza is fun and easy to make. Heck, why not drink the half a beer left over from sauteing the onions while you cook and raise a toast to our German brethren. Cheers!

Oktoberfest Pizza

1 large onion, sliced

1/2 of a beer

1 small apple, thinly sliced

1 sausage, sliced

3/4 cup grated cheese

Saute onions over medium-low heat. After a few minutes when the onions have started to brown, add 1/2 a bottle or can of beer and let them gently simmer. Cook until all the liquid is absorbed and the onions are a golden brown.

When onions are done. Spread them on the bottom of your rolled out pizza dough. Add cheese. Then top with apples and sausage pieces. Salt and pepper to taste.

Bake on the bottom rack of a 500 degree oven for 8-10 minutes. Grab a beer and enjoy!

For a printer friendly version of this recipe, click here.

I was in Portland last weekend. What a great city with an amazing local food scene. One of my favorite finds was a pear hazelnut flatbread. The hazelnuts were toasted and finely chopped then sprinkled on the crust with a little honey drizzled on. The pears were added next. When it came out of the oven, it was topped with some fresh thyme. Simple and Delicious.

As I waited in the check out line at the grocery store, I was surrounded by pizza. Several of the food magazines, including Food & Wine and Vegetarian Times, featured pizza on their covers. It reminded me that fall means pizza. With the cooler weather, people are at home more and are willing to crank their oven up.

Looking to be inspired? Mom’s Pizza Dough has a great library of pizza recipes so get that oven crank’n.

We had a babysitter last Thursday. I made dinner for both my daughter and the sitter ahead of time. What could be easier than pepperoni pizza?

I made a quick tomato sauce with 4 tomatoes on my counter and added some shredded zucchini (I have plenty to use up). Topped the sauce with mozzarella cheese and then P.G. Molinari & Son’s pepperoni and baked it in the oven.

I told the sitter they could eat it room temp or he could throw it back in the oven for 5 minutes.  I don’t know what the did, but they enjoyed it.

My daughter started kindergarten a couple weeks ago. She loves it, but there is still plenty to get used to. For me, the biggest challenge has been packing her lunch every morning.

I had the perfect plan. I got everything for a waste-free lunch even down to the cloth napkins thanks to Etsy.com.

As someone who makes pizza dough by hand all day long, I was totally going to make everything from scratch, including the bread. Like I said, the perfect plan.

Well, hello reality. Look who just showed up!

As I unpacked the groceries on Sunday, I just stared in horror at my pantry filled with processed foods I had banned from my house long ago. Caramel corn rice cakes, store bought sliced bread, and jelly now sit on my shelves. How did this happen?

I’ll tell you how. I am a working mom just trying to figure out in the trenches how to make a healthy lunch that my daughter will eat. (Not because she is a picky eater but because her best friend tells her her lunch is gross everyday.)

I wish I could write that I will implement the perfect plan, but I won’t. My mantra as a mom has always been good enough and today I am reminded of that. Funny how I have to keep re-remembering that. This week’s lunch will be a compromise of homemade and store bought. That will have to be good enough.

I dug up an old recipe I posted last year listing 5 ideas for a brown bag lunch using pizza dough. I’ll make something from here for next week. Good enough, for now anyway.

The beginning of fall means the end of summer vacations, back to school and the return of pizza and movie night for many a household.  You could keep it simple and just put the usual toppings on or you could get inspired and make a pizza topping that ties into a theme with your movie.

Ratatouille is a great movie that all ages can enjoy. Why not rent the movie Ratatouille and make a ratatouille pizza that even Ego, the food critic, would enjoy.

Ratatouille pizza

(This recipe is adapted from Alice Waters’ Chez Panisse Vegetables.)

1 small ( 1/2 a large) eggplant, cut into 3/4 inch cubes

2 small onions

1 large red pepper

2 small zucchini

4 tomatoes

4 cloves garlic, diced

hot pepper flakes (optional)

basil

3/4 cup smoked Gouda cheese, shredded

Cut the eggplant into cubes. Salt it and leave it to drain in a colander.

To peel the skins from the tomatoes, bring a pot of water to boil. Cut a cross in the bottom of the tomatoes. Place in boiling water until the skin starts to peel away from the cut, about 3 minutes. Remove and drain. When cool, remove skins and chop.

Cut up onions, pepper and zucchini into pieces the same size as the eggplant.

Heat olive oil in heavy saute pan. Add the eggplant and gently fry over medium-low heat until it is nice and brown and yummy. Remove from pan.

Add a little more oil as needed. Add onions and saute until they are soft and translucent, about 7 minutes. Add the garlic (and hot pepper flakes if you like) and saute for a couple minutes. Add the remaining vegetables and saute for about 15 minutes, until done. Salt and pepper to taste. When completed, combine

the vegetables and the eggplant. Toss and remove from pan.

Add the tomatoes and basil and saute until tomatoes have cooked down.

When the tomatoes have cooked, remove the basil. Add the vegetables back to the pan and combine. You can make this a day ahead if you would like to let the flavors develop or to save time on pizza night.

Roll out pizza dough. Add ratatouille mixture. Top with cheese and bake in the bottom rack of a 500 degree oven for 8 minutes. If pizza usually takes longer to cook in your oven, leave the cheese off and cook the pizza for 5 minutes before add the cheese. The smoked gouda will burn if you cook it longer than 8 minutes.

Remove pizza from oven and top with fresh basil leaves. Hustle back to the movie to find out if Remy is okay and enjoy!

Mom’s Pizza Dough dry mix is designed to be simple and easy to use. Here are step-by-step instructions.

Step 1

Combine flour mix and yeast packet in a bowl. Add 1 1/4 cup water and mix. When the water is absorbed, use your hands to mix ingredients until all the flour is incorporated.

Step 2

Turn the dough out onto a flat surface. Let rest for about 5 minutes. While you are waiting, clean out your bowl and lightly coat with olive oil.

When ready, kneed with your hands for a couple minutes until the dough is soft and slightly sticky. See image below for visual.

Step 3

Put the dough in the oiled bowl and turn to coat with oil.

Step 4

Cover and let rise until doubled in size and is bubbly. About 2 hours in a warm place or overnight in the refrigerator. For best results, make it a day ahead.

Step 5

Remove the dough from bowl and divide in 2. Form into nice balls. You can either use them immediately or store them away.

Step 6

If freezing or refrigerating the dough, lightly coat in olive oil and place in a plastic bag. Be sure to allow enough room in the bag for the dough to rise as it thaws. Use within 2-3 days if refrigerated and within 3 months frozen.

Making Mom’s Pizza Dough dry mix in a bread machine is quick and easy. Because the mix comes with an instant yeast package, I can use the quick dough setting on my bread machine and have pizza dough ready in 45 minutes.

The step by step process includes:

Step 1

Pour 1 1/4 cup water into the bread machine. Add the flour mix. Create a well in the middle and empty the yeast packet into it. Turn on machine and wait.

Step 2

When the bread machine is done, the dough should have risen almost to the top of the pan. If not, let it sit some more. Because the machine is a little warm from use, the dough will continue to rise nicely.

Step 3

Remove the dough from the machine and cut in half. Form into nice balls. You can either use them right away or store them.

Step 4

If freezing or refrigerating the dough, lightly coat in olive oil and place in a plastic bag. Be sure to allow enough room in the bag for the dough to rise as it thaws. Use within 2-3 days if refrigerated and within 3 months frozen.