That’s right. I finally got my red kitchenaid mixer last week. As usual, my birthday gift didn’t make it to my birthday. Thank you, hubby! I would be remiss not to mention he got a fantastic deal on it too.

On with the pizza I make on pizza nights.

I use the Moosewood Cookbook calzone recipe for my dough, with modifications.

What you’ll need
(I double the amounts to make two pizzas)
1 cup water, wrist-temperature
3 cups flour **sometimes I do half whole wheat, half white other times I use all white depending on what I have at the time
Olive Oil, 1 tsp
3 tsp honey
Salt 1 1/2 tsp
Dry yeast 1 1/2 tsp

What to do
Place water in a medium bowl, add yeast, honey; stir until everything dissolves. Whisk in salt and flour, and when it gets too thick, stir with hand. Knead in bowl 5 min. Brush 1 tsp olive oil over dough, cover, let rise until doubled.

Go outside and play for an hour or so while your dough does it’s thing.

When the dough is ready, punch it down and knead it for a little while, then split it into two sections and place each one on a sprayed baking sheet, let rest.

Over the next 10 minutes or so, I get my toppings ready and stop to spread the dough flat. It takes a few times of spreading and resting before it is all out on the sheet evenly with no holes. At least for me it does.

Once the dough is ready, I put my toppings on. I do one white pizza and one red pizza. The red one is just pizza sauce, mozzarella and pepperoni usually. For the white one, I start by cracking black pepper on the dough, then spreading olive oil on top. Top that with sauteed onion and garlic, then kalamata olives, artichoke hearts and feta cheese.

Bake at 450 for 18 minutes, switching the pizzas on their racks every 6 minutes.

Let cool, eat and enjoy!

Added to Kimba’s DIY Day.

I posted this photo and a few of you asked for me to share the recipe. Today is the day. I made it yesterday for hubby’s birthday and was reminded to blog it.

What you’ll need:
1 – 15 oz can black beans, drained and rinsed ** I use 2 cans
1 – 28 oz can crushed tomatoes, undrained
3/4 cup chopped onions (optional) – I don’t use them because they’re one of the few things my daughter won’t eat. I personally love them in this dish, though.
1/2 cup salsa (optional) ** I use 1 cup
1 tsp. chili powder
1/2 tsp cumin
1 cup light ricotta cheese ** I use 2 cups
1/8 tsp garlic powder
1 egg
10 uncooked lasagna noodles
6 oz shredded cheddar cheese ** I use 8-12 oz

What to do:
Heat oven to 350. Spray 13×9 inch baking dish.
In large bowl, mash beans slightly. Stir in tomatoes, onions, salsa, chili powder and cumin; mix well.

In small bowl, combine ricotta cheese, garlic powder and egg; blend well.

Spread 1 cup of the tomato mixture over bottom of sprayed baking dish. Top with half of the noodles, overlapping slightly. Top with half of the remaining tomato mixture. Spoon ricotta mixture over top; spread carefully. Top wtih half of the cheddar cheese, then with remaining noodles, tomato mixture and the last of the cheddar cheese. Spray sheet of foil with cooking spray; cover baking dish with foil, sprayed side down.

bake at 350 for 40-45 minutes or until noodles are tender. Uncover; let stand 15 minutes before serving.

Enjoy!

If I can keep tiny hands from picking all my strawberries and then popping them in tiny mouths, I am dreaming of making myself a strawberry spritzer. Doesn’t that sound so refreshing? And really simple – my kind of summertime drink.

Smash hulled strawberries, sugar, and fresh lime (hopefully I can pick some from our tree this year too) juice in a glass and top with seltzer.

What is your favorite hot sunny day drink?

I have tried to be somewhat casual about it all. I don’t go out of my way to purposefully get things at the store for pizza night. As long as I have what we need for the dough, we make the pizzas with what we have.

After pizza, we usually play Wii together until bedtime. This is not set in stone, as anyone who knows me knows that I would never play Wii golf in place of watching March Madness. Tonight, it’s white pizza and watching basketball together.

This got me thinking of other simple routines that our family has settled into.

• When hubby gets home each afternoon, he goes straight to the swingset with the kids and pushes them on the swings
• We drink coffee together while he pushes and we chat about our days
• On Saturday and Sunday mornings we have pancakes for breakfast
• When I was growing up, we always had spaghetti for dinner on Monday nights. Still, if I visit my parents on a Monday, we have spaghetti for dinner together.

When I think of simple traditions that form out of habit and a little bit of desire to recreate fond moments, I smile. It makes me happy to think of my kids coming home when they are older, and it’s a Friday, so they ask if they can help me make pizza dough.

What are some simple traditions that your family has created? Tell me about routines with your family that you love.

But I am tired of waiting. And I trust all of you not to sit and pinpoint all the little imperfections that are there still and I am going to show you anyway.

As a refresher, here is the kitchen when we bought the house. As my 4 year old likes to say, this is when the house was disgusting. It really was.

Here it is after we had put in all the new cabinets, countertop, floor, walls, etc…

If you are interested, you can see more at House Remodel Photos page, Progress on Simplifying the Kitchen and Our $3000 Kitchen Makeover.

The past week, we have spent changing some cosmetic stuff. Hubby finished painting the walls Sherwin Williams Regale Blue and then put up the subway tile backsplash I have wanted for the past 2 years. He also added a countertop to the right of the stove, using black granite tiles to match the rest of the kitchen. We had a metal cart that I picked up at a yardsale last year for $10 that he built in under the countertop and now stores my pots and pans that I use the most, along with some of my baking stuff.

Hubby finished painting trim that he installed over two years ago – yes, really. Basically we are attempting to tie up all little loose ends in here – finishing it off so we can simply enjoy it. It’s getting there!

I added an island cabinet that I got on Craigslist a few months ago for $30 (it was along a wall, but I like it better as an island). I still need to find a stool to go there and I know our Goodwill has them often for $4.99 so I am waiting to find one there. I also want to get the Ikea Latt Table and Chairs to go in front of the chalkboard. Ikea doesn’t ship it so I will either drive down there, find it on Craigslist or ebay and have that sometime in the near future.

There is still some touch up painting to do, hubby still has to add trim to the front of the new countertop and then he has to clean up all the paint spills on my floor. But it’s coming along and I am really happy with it so far!

This post is part of Hooked on Fridays at Hooked on Houses. Head on over and see some other house inspiration that bloggers are hooked on.

Also, be sure to check out The Inspired Room’s Beautiful Life series for more inspiration around the blogosphere

Makes 4 loaves

Starter dough (the day before)

What you’ll need

• 2 1/4 cups bread flour
• 1 1/4 cups water
• 1/4 tsp. yeast (dry)

What to do

• In a large bowl or plastic container, combine flour and yeast, then add water.
• Mix with spoon or hands until all dry ingredients are hydrated, it should have no dry spots and be somewhere between a dough and a batter.
• Leave overnight, covered

Final dough

What you’ll need

• 5 1/8 cups bread flour
• 2 cups water
• 1 tablespoon salt
• 2 1/2 teaspoons yeast (dry)
• Starter dough

What to do

(in same container)

• put flour, salt, yeast on top of starter dough (which will now be nice and bubbly and fragrant)
• combine these dry ingredients together so salt and yeast are distributed evenly throughout flour
• add water, hottest you can get it out of the tap
• mix everything together with your hands until there is no dry flour

big sticky mess

• rest for 20 minutes covered
• knead the dough – I left mine in the container and folded it on itself over and over again
• rest for one hour, covered
• fold dough – fold each of the 4 sides into the middle and flip the whole thing over so it is smaller and tighter
• rest for one hour, covered
• cut out rough pieces (you can use a bread knife – wetting it first helps, but I just used my hands- wet-  to make pieces)
• put pieces on baking sheet with tiny amount of olive oil to prevent sticking.
• let rise for 15-20 minutes
• bake at 450 for 20-25 minutes
• check that top and bottom are evenly baking. after 10 minutes, I switched my baking sheets and moved the top sheet to the bottom and bottom sheet to the top. Watch the bottom of the breads so they don’t burn.
• Enjoy! I ate mine by making an olive oil and cracked black pepper dip.

Last night, as I was cracking the whip, not even letting hubby stop to take bathroom breaks, I finally caved and let the man eat some dinner. He sat down to eat and my two amazing children proceeded to bring me to tears. My 4 year old daughter said to her little brother, “Come on, buddy. Mommy really wants this project done” and they proceeded to get out the level, the measuring tape and the drill and pretended to finish the project. I was crying while I snapped this photo.

My daughter has lived in this house for more than half of her life now, so all she knows and remembers is being part of this remodeling project of ours. She embraces it and loves it. She has used it as a learning experience, truly wanting to be part of it and help. It makes me so proud to see her this way – with a power drill in her hand while wearing a dress. She is herself, fully and completely. To see that what our family values and enjoys spending our time on is also something she appreciates and enjoys brings me so much happy. In one moment that was so short, it all fell into place in my head and my heart. This home is right. For me, for us, for our family, this is home. Dust and all.

On another note, while hubby was slaving away on the kitchen last night, I baked bread. It was my first attempt at homemade bread and I was fortunate enough to have a friend who is a professional baker to have given me handwritten directions for making this yummy Ciabbata bread.

I was nice enough to let hubby stop working and enjoy some of it.

I can’t wait to share the kitchen in all it’s glory next week. And if anyone is interested, I can share the bread recipe too.

Photo credits BHG and House Beautiful

This is part of Hooked on House’s Hooked on Fridays blog party. Be sure to check it out to see what others are hooked on. You won’t want to miss the gorgeous Craftsman Bungalow that Julia as featured!

Angela at Cottage Magpie is hosting a Virtual Cookie Exchange, so I thought I’d participate. It was good timing since we’d been planning to make Gingerbread Cookies this weekend.

As with all projects I attempt, this one was not without it’s glitches. I have never made them before without my mom so I was a little nervous. But I had my daughter, a self proclaimed future baker, to help me.

They turned out a-ok thanks to her!

Gingerbread cookies
What you’ll need:

• 8 cups sifted flour
• 3 teaspoons ginger
• 1 heaping teaspo0n cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup sugar
• 2 cups molasses
• 1 cup shortening
• 3 teaspoons baking soda
• 2/3 cup hot water
• 1 egg

What to do:

1. Combine flour ginger, cinnamon and salt. Make a well in center
2. Stir sugar and molasses
3. Add shortening. Pour in hot water combined with soda and mix.
4. Add egg. Stir until completely blended. Dough will be soft and sticky.
5. Chill thoroughly
6. Roll out onto floured pastry cloth or board to 1/4″ thick and cut with cookie cutters.
7. Bake at 400 for 10 minutes

At this point you can do lots of things with your cookies. You could sprinkle them with sugar and place a dab of jam on them. Or trim them in frosting. We dip ours in chocolate, then trim them with frosting and make little frosting dabbed belly buttons on the men, women and snowmen.

They’ve been dipped in chocolate and we’ll be frosting them tomorrow, I hope!

Hot Chocolate Cake Recipe

What you’ll need
8 tablespoons (1 stick) unsalted butter, plus extra for coating
3 tablespoons all-purpose flour, plus extra for dusting
1/2 cup sugar, plus extra for dusting
10 ounces semisweet chocolate, coarsely chopped
4 large eggs
1 large egg yolk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup mini marshmallows
2 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder

What to do

Preheat oven to 375° F. Generously butter, flour, and sugar eight 6-ounce coffee cups or mugs made of ovenproof stoneware (see tip below). Wipe the rims clean.

Place the 8 tablespoons of butter and the chocolate in a medium heatproof bowl over a pan of simmering water and melt, stirring once or twice until smooth. Remove from heat and let cool 5 minutes.

Using a handheld mixer, beat the eggs, yolk, vanilla, salt, and 1/2 cup sugar at the highest speed until the volume doubles and the mixture becomes foamy, about 5 minutes. Stir the 3 tablespoons of flour into the chocolate, then gradually add it to the egg mixture, beating on low until it’s fully incorporated. Ladle the batter into each cup until it’s about 1/2 inch from the rim.

Bake until the cakes puff and begin to crack but the centers are still a bit runny, 13 to 17 minutes. Remove from oven. Sprinkle with marshmallows, then return to oven for 2 to 4 minutes, until the marshmallow tops begin to crisp. Remove from oven; let cool about 5 minutes. Sift the cocoa on top.

Tip: You can bake these individual cakes in coffee mugs or teacups, or use eight 6-ounce ramekins. (To determine if your mugs are ovenproof, refer to the packaging or check with the manufacturer.) Alternatively, a single cake can be made in a 10-inch springform pan or pie plate with enough regular-size marshmallows to cover. To do this, increase the initial baking time to 22 to 25 minutes or, if you prefer a more gooey center, to 17 to 20 minutes.

Here is how mine turned out. Not as pretty as their photo but still looks and tasted sooooo gooey yummy delicious. It was really fun to do with my daughter, who loves anything involving chocolate and marshmallows.