My New Favorite Thing to Make: Pesto Pizza :)

While reading an old issue of Cooking Light in the doctor’s office (I know, I know – I should NOT be touching magazines in the doctor’s office…), I was inspired to make something I hadn’t made since I lived at home: pizza.  My mom made

Pesto pizza with a garlic & herb crust

the best homemade pizza when I was growing up.  Cooking Light had a recipe for pizza that looked delicious, so I decided to give it a try.  I didn’t have a pizza stone, so I decided to go out & buy one.  Long story short, the pizza was a failure.  The recipe called for whole tomatoes instead of sauce, which made the pizza really soggy, and the pizza stone CRACKED in the oven.  No joke – cracked.  Right down the middle.  Awesome.

I decided to buy a perforated pizza crisper (aka circular baking sheet with holes in it) instead.  Sean had the good idea to mimic the pizza we got from Canestaro’s (delicious Italian restaurant in the Fenway.  Definitely worth the trip if you get the chance.) – pesto pizza with chicken.  Success :)  You should make it, also.

Ingredients:

• Refrigerated pizza dough
• Grilled chicken
• Pesto (see pesto recipe here.  It takes 5 minutes – seriously.  You need to make your own pesto.)
• Mozzarella cheese
• Corn meal (for the pan)
• Flour

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees
2. Roll out pizza dough, using the flour as needed to ensure the dough isn’t sticky.  The dough should be thin and even.
3. Evenly sprinkle a small amount of corn meal onto a greased pizza pan
4. Move rolled-out dough onto pan, on top of the corm meal
5. Add pesto onto center of dough and evenly spread outwards with the back of a spoon, creating an even layer on the dough, leaving a 1/4 inch around the edges for the crust
6. Add a thin layer of cheese
7. Add grilled chicken
8. Add additional cheese on top of the whole pizza, leaving space around the edges for the crust
9. Place pizza in preheated oven
10. Cook for 12-15 minutes, or until crust is golden brown
11. Enjoy your pizza :)