Pizza, Mint, & Triple the Christmas

We actually decided to wait until AFTER Thanksgiving this year to put up the Christmas tree. Well, I guess we did not so much decide to wait, but we were forced to wait due to lack of time! Otherwise, I would have had them up 3 weeks ago probably :)

Since this can be a long process and is one that needs to be celebrated, I had to fix a good dinner and of course dessert! My mom came up and spent a few days with me so she was able to be here for all the fun and the tree stand drama! But, we got it all taken care of and all three trees are up (yes, we have 3 trees in our 2 bedroom apartment!). What can I say, we love decorating for Christmas.

For dinner, I made homemade individual pizzas since my husband, mom, and I all like different toppings. I decided to try a new pizza crust recipe, and I absolutely LOVE it. It tastes so good...soft on the inside and slightly crunchy on the outside. You must try this. I am already planning on making it again later this week and using some extra dough to make bread sticks! Trust me on this, this recipe is worth the extra time and effort.

Basic Pizza Dough

Adapted from Alex Guarnaschelli

2 1/4 teaspoons active dry yeast
1 1/2 cups warm water

3 1/2 cups all-purpose flour (plus additional for rolling out dough)

2 teaspoons kosher salt (again, do not use iodized salt)

1/2 teaspoon fresh grated pepper

1 tablespoon honey

1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil (plus some additional for coating the bowl)

In a large bowl, combine the yeast and warm water. Stir to dissolve the yeast then allow the mixture to sit and rest for 5 minutes.

Next, sift about half of the flour over the yeast mixture and blend until smooth with your hands. This is a very messy process, and this is something as a child you would have loved to do. But, it is not so enjoyable as an adult for some. I personally channeled my inner child for this step and enjoyed it :)

Add the salt, pepper and honey and mix to blend (again with your hands). Sift in the remaining flour and mix until all combined. Lightly flour the surface you are working on. Place the pizza dough onto the floured area and knead for 3 to 5 minutes. The flour should feel smooth and the ingredients fully integrated.

Place the dough inside a lightly oiled large bowl-make sure the dough is completely covered in oil so that it does not develop a hard film on it. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and let rest in a warm place, about 1 1/2 hours or until doubled in volume. Mine did not take this long-it only took about 45 minutes, but be prepared just in case.

Press gently on the dough to indent it and place it back onto the floured surface. Divide the dough into the number of pizzas you want to make or keep it into one large ball if you want a large pizza. Cover with a clean kitchen towel and allow the dough to rest for an additional 15 minutes. I omitted this step because we were starving at this point, but next time, I am going to see if it makes any difference.

Roll out your dough and add your toppings...using fresh mozzarella really makes a huge difference that no cheese can compete with. If you are going to go through all this effort, please use quality cheese. And, by the way, sorry there are no pictures to accompany this recipe, but we were famished and devoured our pizzas before the thought of even taking a picture crossed my mind. You will have to wait until next time...

For dessert, it was all about mint and chocolate! I had taken my mom to Frasier's Gourmet Foods for the first time, and I fell in love with the miniature multi-colored chocolate cups. As soon as I saw them, I knew I had to have them and use them that night. So, I got three of them. I was already planning a chocolate mousse or something unique to put in them. However, because we were out fighting crowds shopping the day after Thanksgiving, time got away from me so I had to do something less time consuming. We then went to one of my favorite grocery stores Trader Joe's to pick up shrimp for my pizza only to discover that they had langostino tails as well, which I had to try. While we were there, as I always do, we visited the sample section where they had mint hot cocoa. One sip and I was sold. I knew I had to have it that night. I had been craving hot cocoa for a few weeks, and I knew this would more than do the job. Since I still needed something quick to add to my adorable chocolate cups, my mom suggested using mint chocolate chip ice cream, which was a genius idea. Trader Joe's has really good ice cream too. So, I made my purchases along with some other impulse buys and we headed home and finished our meal with this quick and aesthetically pleasing dessert...

Putting up the Christmas decorations definitely was not anything that we complained about after eating all of this food. The only problem was that we were so full we were ready to take a nap!

enjoy.