Twi-what?

For those of you who didn't know this, I'm a crazy Twihard. Yep, I like sparkly vampires, angsty teen werewolves and the teenage girl with no apparent sense of self preservation. I've read all the book multiple time and seen each of the movies on opening weekend.
This past November, however, I stepped up my game when I went to the midnight showing of Breaking Dawn Part 1 with a large group of other crazy Twilight fans like myself. Before going to the show, we met at someone's house and had a party, which mostly consisted of eating and making ridiculous comments while "watching" Twilight. We actually saw both Eclipse and Breaking Dawn Part 1 in the theatre that night as part of a special double feature which let us avoid most of the annoying teen girls who often interrupt the viewing with their giggles and shrieks. I'm getting ahead of myself though, I was talking about eating.

Since it was my first time hanging out with these ladies (I met them through coworker), I wanted to make sure I brought my a game in terms of the food I brought. With that in mind, I made wedding cupcakes, since in Breaking Dawn Edward and Bella get married. I set them out on a cupcake stand for beautiful presentation's sake

The ladies smiled and thought they were so cute, and I was mildly pleased. The best reactions, however, came when I turned the cupcake stand around to reveal the true genius of these cupcakes. They were not only themed around the BD wedding, but also simply Twilight themed, which means, they were..

When the moon hits your eye...

I like trying out different mixes and whatnot for gluten free baked goods, so a while back I bought some Bob's Red Mill GF Pizza Dough mix. I made up the dough, separated it into individual sized pizza balls and froze them for late use. This recipe came from one of those dough balls. Keep in mind that like most of my recipes, the amount of most of the ingredients is up to your tastebuds and preference

Ingredients:

• 1 pizza crust (baked or unbaked)
• 1/4 - 1/2c pizza sauce
• 1-2c shredded mozzarella cheese
• Hormel Turkey pepperoni (15-20 slices)
• 1T olive oil
• 1-2T parmesean cheese

If you're using an unbaked crust, follow that crust's baking instructions to firm it up some before adding toppings or you will end up with mushy pizza. Once it is par-baked, brush it with olive oil to add flavor and help it crisp. 

Spoon sauce onto the crust. Sprinkle the sauce with parmesean cheese to help the mozzarella stick once it melts (I learned that on a field trip to a pizzeria in 1st grade!)  

Add half your mozzarella. While you can always use shredded mozzarella from a bag for the sake of time and convenience (and I have on many occasions), nothing beats the fresh, moist flavor of cheese you shredded only minutes before baking. 

Add your pepperoni

Add the rest of your mozzarella

Bake according to crust instructions until the cheese is golden

 

Sad but true, oh, and summer, hurry up...

My food life has been terribly boring and sad lately. My family moved in October, and we're still not totally finished with the old house, so everything has been very busy and up in the air. I feel like I'm not getting much in the way of real nutrition, which is not good since I'm seeing a nutritionist and have to turn in food logs!

One good thing is that with spring here we're **GARDEN PLANNING**, so the summer should be "ripe" with possibilities :)

Part of our garden plans include making this one a raised bed garden. We're using a pair of kits from a hardware store to create it, and it is supposed to be good for your crops in that it allows the roots to grow deeper in good soil as well as allowing proper water drainage. So far the definite plans are zucchini, peppers, tomatoes, but there is always room for more tasty additions. Our new house had a potted herb garden already going, but I'm not sure what all will come back. So far, the chives are doing well (I used them in a chicken breast dish last week) and I can see rosemary remains, so perhaps that will return. I transplanted my large sage bush from the other house, and it seems I got in the ground in time, as it is thriving in its new home. I've got a few food-ventures to share with you, I've still been taking foodographs of the few yummy things I've made. Coming up, a budget friendly Sbux alternative, taco salad, french toast muffins and vampire cupcakes... Stay tuned!