Fab Food Friday: Pasta or Pizza?!

In preparation for this Friday's post I had a recipe I wanted to try out, but since we were already planning on doing pizza today for our Friday Night Pizza Night I made it yesterday...

Every once and a while I check in on The Pioneer Woman's blog (if you haven't discovered "her", you must! I find her fabulous in many ways...) and a few days ago she had posted a PESTO pizza recipe with a link to a recipe in June where she had made a Creamy Pesto Pasta. Pesto...mmm...I knew I liked her! Deciding that I had about a third of a jar of pesto in the fridge that I needed to use up this week I decided to make her Creamy Pesto Pasta. Only I tinkered with it of course to make it a little healthier :) Anyways, I say all that to say this: We made it. It was good......but tonight's pizza was better! So instead of doing a long drawn out blog with one recipe, I am going to do two condensed recipes!

First Runner Up: Creamy Pesto Pasta

9-12 ounces pasta (I used whole wheat rotini)

3 Tb butter or margarine

2-3 Tb of flour

3/4 cup milk

1/2-3/4 cup of Parmesan cheese

1/2 cup pesto

1 whole tomato, diced

1. Boil your pasta

2. Meanwhile in a large skillet heat your butter over medium heat

3. Using a whisk mix together your butter and flour, should be clumpy

4. Pour in your milk and whisk until smooth and thickened

5. Mix in your pesto and about 1/2 cup of Parmesan cheese

6. Turn burner to low and add diced tomato to the sauce and let simmer for a few minutes

7. Drain pasta and rinse

8. Toss pasta and sauce together in a large bowl and top with remaining Parmesan(this makes it by the way!)

I LOVE this huge pasta bowl! Perfect for tossing :)

Grand Prize: Leftover Pizza (you'll understand in a minute)

This pizza, which was amazing, was topped with, well.....leftovers in our fridge :) In order to jazz up our pizza tonight I looked in our fridge to see what we had. I started with the basics:

Home-made whole wheat pizza dough(we use the PW's recipe but use WW flour or use your own fav dough)

large tomato, cut in thin slices

2 oz block of cheddar cheese, grated

4 oz block of mozzarella, grated

about 1/3 cup of pesto

Then I continued with some of the leftovers from the Hawaiian Chicken we made the other day(don't get grossed out...it turns out REALLY yummy!)

 green bell pepper slices that were cooked on the grill

diced red onion

pineapple chunks

and to top it off, grilled terriaki (marinated) chicken (this was my hubbs idea, and a GREAT one!)

1. Preheat oven to 475 degrees F

2. Roll dough out onto your pan (we use a pizza stone)

3. Spread pesto onto dough

4. Top with tomato slices

5. Spread a little cheese

6. Top with bell pepper, onion, pineapple and the rest of the cheese

7. Because this was a last minute add-in, top with chopped chicken

Chicken, the hubbs is a genius!

8. Bake for 10-12 minutes

I heart pizza...especially from scratch

Oh my heavens, this was tasty! I LOVED all the veggies(my hubbs picked half of his off and child #1 took all of the veggies off....BUT I tried!), but I will say that the chicken was the cherry on top.

What did I learn about the secret to making good pizza? Make Hawaiian Chicken two days before.

How Beautiful

This morning our alarm clocks(aka our boys) went off around 5:30. About an hour and a half too early. Luckily we got child number 1 back in bed, but child number 2 wanted to play. I was tired and not thrilled about getting up at this hour, but decided I was going to be positive about this (a lesson I have learned from a good friend to enjoy even the not so glamorous moments of being a mom because there are so many who would give anything to have this opportunity). It wasn't anything a cup of coffee (and a little under eye cream) couldn't fix...

I was surprised by a sight that I have not seen in quite sometime...a sunrise. Peaceful and beautiful, I was given this gift. Another gift was the sweet smiles of my youngest, getting to spend some one-on-one time with his momma. I felt pure joy and even though I was awakened earlier than normal, I felt at peace and rested. God is Good.

The beautiful sight outside my window reminded me of this song and I wanted to share it....

How Beautiful

How Beautiful the hands that served
The Wine and the Bread and the sons of the earth
How beautiful the feet that walked
The long dusty road and the hill to the cross
How Beautiful, how beautiful, how beautiful is the body of Christ

How Beautiful the heart that bled
That took all my sins and bore it instead
How beautiful the tender eyes
That choose to forgive and never despise
How beautiful, how beautiful, how beautiful is the body of Christ

And as He lay down His life
We offer this sacrifice
That we will live just as He died
Willing to pay the price
Willing to pay the price

How Beautiful the radiant bride
Who waits for her Groom with His light in her eyes
How Beautiful when humble hearts give
The fruit of pure love so that others may live
How beautiful, how beautiful, how beautiful is the body of Christ

How beautiful the feet that bring
The sound of good news and the love of the King
How Beautiful the hands that serve
The wine and the bread and the sons of the Earth
How Beautiful, how beautiful, how beautiful is the body of Christ

Here's to hoping your day will be filled with joy......and if you woke up as early as I did, maybe even a nap later on in the day :)

Girl: Gilmore Style.....

This last weekend I was soooo over this heat and decided to transport myself into a quaint and quirky northeastern town named Stars Hollow. Whenever I am watching this show it just screams FALL and cool weather...quite the lovely notion in this 100 degree weather. Gilmore Girls is one of my all time favorite sitcoms for so many reasons, mainly because not only does it scream FALL but it also exudes GIRL. My husband can appreciate the show for it's humor but ultimately does. not. get. it. I understand and relate to it perfectly :) I decided to share with you 10 reasons why I ADORE this show.....

Gilmore Top Ten

1. As previously mentioned, the weather! No matter the season it always seems pleasant and manageable. And let's face it, Fall in the Northeast is BEAUTIFUL and it stirs up feelings of "home."

Thinking of this makes me want to go to a pumpkin patch and make fresh apple cake...torture, sorry.

2. Lukes. Small town diners have a special place in my heart. I enjoy "Lukes" because it represents great, REGULAR, coffee...it is a place that still keeps sacred the notion that it is rude to be on the phone while you are in the company of others... fabulous, yet simple, food(he is passionate about that one)And I must say I love the owner's stubborn, "I'm not going to put up with that" attitude.....(not to say one should be like that all the time, I mean, I'm still a lady).

3. Kirk. Strange, multi-talented, sleepwalking...Kirk. Everyone needs a friend like him.

4.The Dragonfly Inn. I believe Inn's were made for girls. Homey, quaint, fantastic food by Sookie, and it seems like there is always something interesting going on there. And let's face it, they have the most interesting concierge...

5. The Town Square. If they are looking for someone, where do they go? The town square. If something crazy is going on, where is it usually taking place? The town square...because the town revolves around it. I love that. They don't write it off as the "old part of town," it is important and considered the "core." (Okay, I get that it could just be the studio's efforts to save money by using the town square set repeatedly, but dream here with me....)

6. Lorelai's parents. They care, right? Pushy, loving, and let's face it, they are loaded. I'm not going to dive deeper on this one...

7. Yale. Love the school pride. Love Rory's college years. Love the coffee cart that seems to be all over campus. Love that darn cute bulldog.

8. Mrs. Kim. Wow, she's a lot to handle. She's like the Soup Nazi of antiques. Props to Lane for surviving in that house. And I love finding out the quirky and surprising side to Mrs. Kim in season's 5-7...just sayin.

9. The lack of food in the Gilmore household. Correction, there is leftover pizza, Chinese, burgers and, of course, Pop-Tarts. But what I mean is food that you can actually make (not just order) a meal out of. Lorelai is dead set on not cooking, which honestly is kinda lame, but at the same time pretty funny and understandable considering she had maids and personal chefs doing everything for her while growing up. They are lucky they have Sookie and Luke in their life.....

10. The quick, witty, and straight-forward banter they ensues not only between Lorelai and Rory, but between most of the characters on the show. The characters don't take themselves too seriously and at the same time seem comfortable with who they are. They don't hold back..If only we had the kind of courage to be who we really are without reservation.

Now I know there are more fellow Gilmore Girls addicts out there, so I'm wondering what is your reason for adoring this wonderful show? And yes, men are encouraged to dwell on this as well....

Here's to hoping cool weather comes soon.......