Healthy "Pizza"

So I already told you that I've been following Joel Furhman's "Eat to Live." Just to set the record straight, I do this 90% of the time. The other 10% of the time I eat what I want. An example of my typical week looks like this:
Monday thru Friday: fresh fruits and veggies; beans & nuts; and tofu; 1-2 servings of whole grains a day; green tea & water. Saturday night: pizza and beer (or some other yummy meal indulgence).

I have had to get creative in finding fast meals to make M-F for me and my family. One of my favorites is healthy "pizza." I am quite fond of all pizzas, healthy or not, so I find any excuse to eat it. Here is one of my standby meals for when I get home late and don't have much time to cook:
1 ball whole wheat pizza dough
tomato sauce (recipe in another posting)
1 can artichoke hearts, drained
oregano & parsley.

Preheat the oven to 475*. Roll out your dough & place on a pizza pan. Roll up the edges of the pizza to make a crust (this prevents the edges from burning). Lightly spray with pure olive oil cooking spray. Cover pie with tomato sauce. Now chop up those artichoke hearts very fine. It's almost like you are making an artichoke spread. Spread the hearts across the entire pizza. Sprinkle with oregano & parsley. Now, if you are ignoring Dr. Fuhrman, you can sprinkle some parmasean across the top of the pizza here. It will get brown and yummy after baked. Lightly spray the top with more olive oil. Throw it in the oven, and bake till the crust begins to brown. Congrats, you just ate an entire pound of green vegetables!

Toasted pita with pestos

I think pesto is my new favorite food. You can make so many different kinds of pesto, and they keep in the fridge a long time (and freezer too!). Freeze your pesto in ice cube trays, then pop out and put in a ziplock bag for individual portions. Pesto is great when you are busy and don't have time to make a big weeknight dinner. I posted a recipe in fall of '08 for my mother-in-law's basil pesto. But this year I have been making artichoke pesto!!
You can find a gazillion different artichoke pesto recipes on the web, and now here is number gazillion-and-one.
Artichoke Lemon Pesto
1 can artichoke hearts (8 oz), drained
5 T olive oil
5 T grated pecorino cheese (or you can use parm.)
1/3 c. fresh basil leaves
4 T. fresh lemon juice
1 cup nuts (I use pine nuts, but you can also use walnuts. toast them for a different flavor if you like)
2 cloves garlic
salt to taste

Throw the artichoke hearts, nuts, and cheese in the food processor and pulse a few times. Then add all other ingredients and whiz it up. You can add more oil or water to loosen the pesto if it is too thick. Taste and adjust the seasoning with salt.

Now that you've got your pesto, you can get to work putting together your fast dinner. Spread the pesto on a whole wheat pita, and top with a big fat slice of roasted red pepper (recipe posted earlier this year). Slap it in the toaster oven for 5 minutes, watching to make sure the pita doesn't get too crispy. Serve with a salad or soup.

Pesto can be made from: basil, sun-dried tomatoes, spinach, hearts of palm, olives, roasted red peppers, and even figs!
Try pesto in these other fun ways:
on baked potatoes, over chicken or fish prior to baking, with a baguette and brie, on apple slices, tossed with boiled chilled shrimp for a fancy shrimp salad, swirled into your tomato soup, as salad dressing.