Tuesday, April 5, 2011

How-Tuesday: How to Make Your Leftovers into Specialty Pizzas!

My husband and I both hate leftovers, so my husband's solution is to "refashion" them into something else. Our favorite way to do this is with making homemade pizza. This idea started after a week-long vacation, where we scheduled pizza on the last day and made several different pizzas using the leftovers from the rest of the week. You'd be surprised at how many of your leftovers can be made into a delicious pizza! Think outside the box!

Just last week I made Sweet and Spicy Chicken with a side of corn and pinto beans. Later that week we did a pizza crust with enchilada sauce, the chicken, the corn and beans, and some cilantro and cheese on top and it was fabulous! If you've eaten at specialty pizza places, you know that there are lots of amazing sauces you can use for pizza, you don't have to just do tomato! You can even leave off the sauce altogether and just brush with a light oil before topping.

So what types of leftovers can you make into a pizza? Pretty much any type of Mexican food is going to lend itself to a delicious pizza - carne asada, carnitas, even tacos! Also, consider using the jarred pesto they sell at Costco, and topping with leftover grilled chicken and vegetables. After spaghetti and meatballs, you could use the sauce and meatballs for a pizza and top with some extra cheese (I'd leave out the pasta, though). I've never done this, but I bet you could do leftover teriyaki chicken with some pineapple as well. BBQ Chicken, of course, would be easy and amazing. We just had a pizza that was just strips of steak, some feta, and caramelized onions - a great way to use up leftover steak.

Here's the menu of one of my favorite pizza places if you want to browse for some ideas, and of course there's always California Pizza Kitchen. They've got a Chicken Cordon Bleu pizza, a Chicken Parmesan pizza, a Southwestern Taco pizza - my mind is spinning with new ideas!

Hopefully I can talk my husband into typing up his recipe for homemade crust and posting it here for all of us - it's fabulous!

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1 comment:

Brianne said...

Such a good idea! I love the Asian BBQ Pizza that's on Our Best Bites. We used the chicken from it for the pizza, and then I used it on salads for lunch for a couple days after that. And the alfredo sauce could be used in lots of recipes too!