Saturday, December 3, 2011

grilled pizza

so there is a classy vegan restaurant in the west loop neighborhood called karyn's on green.  this karyn woman also has a few other vegan and raw restaurants in Chicago but we have yet to frequent those establishments.  anyways...we got all gussied up and made the trek in the chilly Chicago wind and went to karyn's on green to see what "fancy" vegan food would look like.  we split an appetizer: chorizo sliders and our main courses were chicken legs and an arugula pizza.  the food was pretty good.  the chicken legs had an excellent texture.  the pizza was inspired.  or should I say inspiring?
cut to the middle of the summer and we're wondering what to make for dinner.  arugula pizza!  this pizza from karyn's used thinly sliced yukon gold potatoes to replicate the texture of cheese.  it was topped with caramelized onions, garlic oil and arugula.  since we're only classy sometimes, we didn't get quite as fancy as karyn.
grilled arugula pizza:
pizza crust - we bought ours pre-made but we have subsequently been graced with the recipe for a delicious pizza crust which we will definitely use in the future.
3-4 yukon gold potatoes
small red onion
a whole bunch of arugula
goat cheese - yeah, yeah, totally not vegan but totally delicious and can be eliminated if you're going vegan

first you must prepare your toppings.
heat up the grill.
boil a pot of water.
thinly cut the potatoes into rounds - a mandolin is an extremely helpful tool for this procedure.
place the potatoes into the boiling water for a few minutes.  you want the potatoes to be tender.  we boiled the potatoes in batches and used a delicate hand so as to preserve the shape of the potato rounds (because who doesn't like beautiful food?)
thinly slice the red onion - mandolin not necessary
brush some oil onto the grill and onto the bottom of the pizza crust.
arrange the cooked potato rounds on the crust so that it is covered.
place the onion slices on top of the potatoes.
put the pizza on the grill and close the lid.
once the crust is warm and crispy, place handfuls of arugula on top and close the lid of the grill for just a minute or two.
once the arugula is wilted, remove the pizza from the grill and top with goat cheese if so desired.

the potatoes give the pizza a heartiness that you wouldn't expect to find in a grilled pizza.  once it's time to bust out the grill again, we'll have to try some topping variations.

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