Pizza Pizza!: Pizza Dough From Scratch

Pizza has to be the number one favorite food in America, and there is a never-ending list of places to buy it and ways to fix it. However, no matter whether it's Domino's or DiGiorno, there's a plethora of yucky preservatives and food additives in the ingredients, so when the opportunity came to make my own, I gave it a try!

Lucky for me, my husband came home a couple weeks ago with almost two whole blocks of smoked mozzarella cheese that he got for free from his work. What are we going to do with that? I thought, as I pondered the sheer amount of cheese. The answer turned out to be make my own dough and have some pizza!

I found that pizza dough is extremely easy to make, and you can add whichever herbs and spices you want. I actually tried two different recipes in the last couple weeks, and while one turned out good, the other was a disaster. I found that you absolutely must have a recipe with yeast --- non-yeast recipes just do not work well at all.

A "Healthier" Pie: Fruit with an Oil Crust!

Since I have had a little more free time this summer, I have been experimenting in cooking all kinds of things from scratch that I've always wanted to try. One item I've been playing around with is fruit pies, which are the ultimate summer dessert in my opinion! 

I first thought of making a pie when I found myself with a bunch of cherries in my fridge that I didn't know what to do with. I bought them on sale and I thought I would enjoy snacking on them, but I didn't. They stained my fingers and I just didn't like them on their own. So I thought..."Hey, I've got these cherries, and a couple apples... why not a pie or a tart?"