Fits the Feingold Diet: Hawaiian Pizza Alfredo

Stage One of the Feingold Elimination Diet takes out a lot of fruits and veggies with salicylic acid since some kids can definitely have a sensitivity to these foods.  One of these foods is the tomato.  Oh, how we have missed the tomato!  Little did I realize how often I made Italian or Mexican dishes in the past, all of course showcasing the tomato.  A few weeks ago, the Drama Queen asked me if there was a way we could still have pizza.  "Well, honey, we can't have tomatoes right now," was my immediate answer, but then I thought, "Why not try making a white pizza?"  And here, my friends, is the result - hawaiian pizza alfredo.
For the dough, you need:
   1 cup lukewarm water
   1 TBS active dry yeast
   1 TBS oil
   1 tsp salt
   2 1/2 to 2 3/4 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
For the alfredo sauce, you need:
   4 TBS butter
   4 TBS unbleached all-purpose flour
   dash of salt
   dash of black pepper
   2 cups milk
   1/3 to 1/2 cup Parmesan cheese
For the toppings, you need:
   1 can pineapple chunks, drained (save juice for cooking the chicken)
   1 lb cooked boneless skinless chicken breast, cut into small cubes and cooked in the pineapple juice until no longer pink
   2 - 3 cups of shredded cheese (I used colby jack, but mozzarella would work well too)

Okay, let's make a pizza! (well, two actually...)
     Make your pizza dough first by adding the yeast to the lukewarm water and letting it sit for a couple of minutes.  Then add in the oil, salt, and 1 1/4 cups flour and mix well.  Keep adding the rest of the flour until you have a soft dough that pulls away from the sides of the bowl.  Turn dough out onto a floured surface and knead for six minutes until dough is smooth/elastic.  Put your dough into a large greased bowl, turn the dough over to grease the dough, and cover bowl with towel.  Put the bowl in a warm place for the dough to rise until doubled (about 80 to 90 minutes).  (I turn my oven on its lowest setting for 10 seconds and then turn it off.  The inside of the oven is then the perfect temperature for allowing the dough to rise.)  Next, turn the dough out onto a floured surface and divide into two equal pieces.  Roll each piece into a smooth, even rectangle onto a cookie sheet.
     Preheat the oven to 425 degrees.  While the oven is heating, make your alfredo sauce.  Melt the butter in a saucepan over medium heat.  When completely melted, add the flour, salt, and pepper, and whisk until completely combined.  Pour in the milk and whisk constantly until the mixture starts to thicken.  Add the Parmesan cheese to your taste and stir to combine.  If sauce is too thick, add a little more milk.  Remove sauce from heat and immediately spread it over your pizza crusts.
     Sprinkle the shredded cheese over the alfredo sauce and then add the chunks of pineapple and chicken pieces evenly over the pizzas.  Bake in the oven at 425 degrees for 15 - 18 minutes, when the crust edge is lightly browned and cheese is melted.  (The center of the pizza may seem a little soft and underdone, but it is just the alfredo sauce).

Wait a few minutes, then slice up into squares and enjoy!
 

Fits the Feingold Diet: Crunchy Cheese Stars

So in case you haven't noticed, I have four kids ages six and under.  This means that their little tummies are often empty, and the little beggars will come around looking for snacks.  Pre-Feingold, I would give them cheese and crackers, carrot sticks, tortilla chips, granola bars, goldfish, popcorn, etc.  While some of those are still good options for the offspring, manufactured snacks such as goldfish, graham crackers, and chips are out unless I want to shell out a lot of money for the organic, no-additive variety.  The frugal me says that's not okay, especially when my kids chow through a little box of crackers in one day.  Just sayin'.  So I have been on the hunt for recipes to make my own crackers (thank you Pinterest!) with these three goals in mind:  1) it has to have healthy ingredients  2) it has to be simple and not-too-time-consuming  and 3) it has to be tasty enough that the kids will eat it willingly - otherwise, it's so not worth it!  And in my search, I found this recipe for cheese crackers.  Five ingredients.  Prep sounded simple.  Baking sounded easy.  Pictures looked awesome.  And so I tried them.  Here's how my version went down:

First, I made the dough.  It's really just like making a pie crust, with the addition of cheddar cheese of course.  I took 4 TBS of butter, cubed it up, and threw it in my food processor.  Next I shredded up the cheddar cheese to get 8 ounces (make sure to use Feingold approved cheese) and attempted to add that to my food processor.  It was then I realized that I did not own a full-size food processor, but rather a "mini", which was not large enough to fit this recipe.  What to do, what to do?  I moved the cubed butter and shredded cheese to my blender, added a cup of flour, 3/4 teaspoon of salt, and pressed the button.  What happened next was a whole lot of nothing.  The blades whirled merrily around, doing nothing.  I shook the blender and did a lot of very-unculinary-like things to try to make it work.  Nothing.  Still persevering, I transferred the whole chunky mix to my Kitchenaid mixer.  I put that baby on high until finally the mixture was incorporated enough to add the 2 TBS cold water.   I then transferred the cracker dough (finally!!) to plastic wrap, wrapped it up tightly, and put it in the fridge for thirty minutes.  (Or maybe it was an hour, I did get pretty caught up in some Facebooking and Pinteresting...)

The next step was to put the dough on a sheet of wax paper and roll it out as thin as you can.  Realizing that I only had parchment paper in my pantry, I decided it would work just as well and commenced with the rolling.  This takes some muscle work, ladies!  The paper kept shifting on the table, and my only solution was to get one knee up on the table to hold down the paper while I rolled that dough.  And no, I did not get you all a picture of that athletic feat!  Eventually, I got a nice, even, thin slab of dough to cut out my stars.  Our Ordinary Life creatively made her own cutters out of a soda can.  I happened to have a little star cutter that worked just fine.  I cut and cut and cut and cut and put all those cheesy stars on my cookie sheet, close together because they wouldn't spread at all.  And then I baked 'em for fifteen minutes at 350 degrees.

Results?  Crunchy, buttery, cheesy, tasty crackers that were more than just a little addictive!  I rerolled the remaining dough a few more times to cut out the rest of the stars and baked them too.  What crackers actually made it past the hungry crew lying in wait in the living room were stored in an airtight container for future snacking.  And despite all my struggles with evil kitchen appliances and slippery dough, I felt it was very worth it.

I did some math for you all to figure out the cost of making a batch of these yummy crackers.  I used average costs for butter, cheese, and flour, with the final total being about $1.50 for 12 ounces of delicious cheesiness.  That's a lot cheaper than Annie's Homegrown Cheddar Bunnies!

I made these crackers a second time this past week, using the mixer straight away instead of messing with the other appliances.  My dough was not as pliable that time around and was much harder to roll thin.  I think I'm going to have to spring for a full-size food processor.  Me thinks there will be many more recipes in my future using this machine...