Saturday started off with a beautiful sunrise and from there I headed to the garden to pick tomatoes. The cherry tomatoes have been prolific all season but the larger tomatoes have not been that productive. As you can see, the sink is full of yellow tomatoes (these are called lemon tomatoes). If you haven't tried them, I would encourage you to do so. They do not have a lemon taste but they are sweet and have a wonderful flavor. They are heirloom and have been a good producer this season.
I haven't had enough large tomatoes to can this season but my daughter reminded me of my dehydrator and I plan on getting it out and dehydrating some of the yellow tomatoes. I made a large batch of salsa for my children on Sunday with all the cherry tomatoes. It turned out great and they will love it.
I also made some more basil pesto. I was soaking the basil in the sink. I don't normally soak the basil because if you get it right after the dew in the morning it is usually pretty clean but we have had so many grasshoppers this year. Their little poop is usually on some of the leaves so I wash it in the sink. :)
Sunday, I also made Date Nut muffins. This is a wonderful recipe from a lady in our co-op group years ago. If you like dates you will love these muffins. They are very moist and sweetened with brown sugar and some chocolate chips. Half of these will also be shared with my kids.
I really like calzones, my husband not so much. But I have a good pizza recipe and I thought I would try my hand at one for dinner on Sunday. I'll show you my failures as well as my successes. It didn't turn out exactly the way I thought. I have some work to do on the construction of the calzone. The crust is really good and that's the recipe I will share with you. First, let me give you the muffin recipe.
Date Nut Muffins
3 cups flour
1/2 tsp. salt
5 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. baking soda
6 tablespoons oil
2 eggs
2 cups buttermilk
1 cup brown sugar
1 cup chopped dates
1 cup chopped pecans
1/2 cup chocolate chips
These are very easy. Stir together all the dry ingredients then add brown sugar, dates, nuts, and chocolate chips. Stir once again. Then add oil, eggs, and buttermilk. Stir just until combined. Spoon into muffin cups.
Grease muffin tins well. Bake at 350 degrees for 15-20 minutes. Makes 24 muffins.
Pizza Crust
1 package of yeast
1 tsp. sugar
1 cup warm water
1 tablespoon salt
2 tablespoons olive oil
3 cups of flour
In a mixer with a dough hook add water, sugar and yeast stir a little to mix these ingredients. Let this stand for 5 or 10 minutes until mixture become foamy. Then start your mixer on low and add the salt and olive oil. Add flour a little at a time until it is well incorporated. You will need to stop and scrape the edges and probably take dough off of hook and then continue to mix. If the dough is crumbly at a little more water, if it is sticky add a little more flour. You will probably not add all of the 3 cups. Once the dough is not sticky or crumbly turn up the speed on the mixer and mix until the dough pulls from the bowl and forms a ball.
Put dough onto a lightly floured surface and kneed several times and form into a ball and then place into a well greased glass bowl and turn dough over on both sides to coat ball. Cover with saran wrap or wet dish towel and keep in a warm place for the dough to rise for one hour.
Once dough has risen turn out onto a lightly floured surface again. Roll and stretch the dough into a cylinder and divide into 3 equal parts. Cover and let it rest for 10 minutes.
Then roll out dough into a 12 inch circle about 1/8 inch thick. Drizzle olive oil on crust and then add your toppings. Slide dough onto a hot stone in the oven and bake at 400 degrees for 12-15 minutes.
Before you add the dough onto stone, have the stone in the oven at 500 degrees to get it really hot. You need a pizza paddle and you coat it with a little flour or corn meal build your pizza on the paddle and then slide the pizza onto the stone. Crispy crust every time. Just the way my husband likes it!
I don't go to all this work very often although I will say that it taste wonderful. It's a lot better than the frozen pizza's I enhance by adding extra ingredients.
One thing I have always wanted to try is taking homemade pizza dough and putting it on the grill. I remember years ago seeing Martha Stewart do this and the pizza's look wonderful with all the fresh ingredients that you can use.
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