CAULIFLOWER PIZZA
Time: 1 hour
Serving: 8
📷
Cooking spray
4 cups frozen riced cauliflower
1 egg
1 tablespoon ground basil
1 tablespoon garlic salt
Mozzarella (optional)
Parmesan (optional)
Marinara sauce (optional)
Pesto sauce (optional)
Fresh basil (optional)
Tomatoes (optional)
Chicken meatballs (optional)
Cardboard
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.
Make sure to let the frozen cauliflower thaw completely. Once thawed, drain all of the water out of the riced cauliflower using a paper towel or dish towel.
Once dried, move the cauliflower and add the ground basil and garlic salt.
Beat an egg in a separate bowl, then pour the mixture into the bowl of dry ingredients and mix together. It is normal if it doesn’t look or feel like pizza dough.
Cut out a piece of cardboard in a circle in the size that you want your pizza to be. It can be a bit bigger or smaller, but it is probably easier if it is larger. Set the cardboard on the baking tray.
Press the dough into a circle on top of the cardboard. If the pizza hangs off the sides of the cardboard either cut out a new circle, or spray cooking spray on the tray. Make the dough either ¼ of an inch or ½ of an inch thick depending on how thick you want your crust. Make the edges of the circle higher than the middle to make a crust.
Put the crust in the oven for 30-35 minutes. It is ready when it’s golden. Then, turn the crust over using a spatula and put it back in the oven for 7-10 minutes.
Add the desired ingredients. First add the sauce, then the cheese, then the other toppings. Stick it in the oven for 5-10 minutes until the cheese is melted, but not hard.
CAPE COD
“BOOM!”
My big brown eyes searched for the striking bolts of yellow light in the pitch black sky through the dripping windows of the yellow beach house. A blinding bolt cut through the night sky, illuminating the thick charcoal clouds and exciting my eleven-year-old self.
The scent of melted mozzarella, parmesan, and sweet marinara sauce intrigued my nostrils as I looked over my bony shoulder at three warm boxes of pizza surrounded by four dark haired girls and one little brunette boy seated on the spiral green and blue circular rug.
“Come eat, Dana,” Mom called from the giant white couch on the opposite side of the room.
I stood up from my spot on the brown straw-like carpet, which made deep marks on my scrawny tanned thighs, then stepped towards the circle of pizza-eaters on the braided rug. As I sat down in a criss-cross applesauce position, Bliss’s pale hands held a paper plate with a wide slice of pepperoni pizza in my direction. My shy face flashed a quick smile of gratitude at her as her green eyes sitting beneath her dark eyebrows winked back at me.
The scent of the garlicky crust and the warmth of the plate in my hand made my mouth water as I eyed the gooey cheese slightly slipping off the edges of the thin crust. Biting into the piece, my mouth was filled with cheesy goodness. This slice had the perfect cheese to sauce ratio that I had not experienced at any other pizza place. Sweet Tomatoes was our favorite restaurant in Yarmouth, and we made sure to eat at least ten boxes every summer when we visited the Bonan’s beach house in Cape Cod.
“BOOM!”
The powerful sounds of thunder startled me, taking my attention away from the deliciousness of the pizza. We hadn’t encountered a summer storm this intense during our past vacations to this small beachside town. Though, I recalled a distinct memory of the first time we visited Yarmouth with the Bonan family. This first trip started the tradition of renting minivans for our six-member family everytime we vacationed in Cape Cod. For some reason, someone left all of the windows down in our red minivan parked in the pebbled driveway of the quaint yellow beach house, which no one seemed to remember when it started pouring rain later that day. The next day, when we decided to drive to Provincetown, we noticed the windows and the damp seats of the car. A strong mildew smell was especially apparent. We were forced to sit in that wet, horrid smelling car for a large portion of the day, which was one of my least enjoyable experiences in Cape Cod.
“I kinda like the stormy weather. It’s kinda exciting,” Blythe’s pale freckled face shared,
“Me too,” Hannah’s petite self nodded. It made sense that they were best friends because they seemed to agree on almost everything.
“You know what I think we should do?” Keeyana smiled. We all stared at her waiting for her suggestion.
“Let’s go drive around!” she exclaimed. Ever since she got her license in May, all she wanted to do was drive.
“Yes!” Bliss said excitedly. She was a couple years younger than Keeyana, which meant that she was at the age of being a suck-up to anyone older than her. I was never sure if she actually liked Keeyana, or if she just wanted to seem cool to an older person.
“Yay!” Dalton’s chubby-cheeked face beamed.
After asking Mom and Charles, Bliss and Blythe’s dad, we sprinted out of the white door, attempting to jump through the sliding minivan doors as fast as possible.
Once the car started, the LMFAO album Sorry For Party Rocking, which had been released right before this trip, started blasting through the poor quality speakers. The whole album was sort of like our summer anthem. Looking back, I´m very happy our culture has strayed away from making any more songs similar to those of the pop music of 2011.
Fat raindrops pounded on the roof and slid down the windows of the minivan, as Keeyana’s stubby fingers put the key in the ignition, making my cushy seat vibrate. We started driving down the street, not for the purpose of getting somewhere, but to merely drive around the neighborhood. The whole car was bobbing their heads while belting the lyrics of every song that came on.
Gradually, Keeyana’s foot pressed harder on the gas pedal, causing the trees and houses to fly past the window. All of a sudden waves of water sprayed up from the road like a tsunami. The car came to an abrupt halt as we all gasped.
“Puddles!” Blythe yelled, causing all of us to burst out laughing.
“Let’s go through more!” Hannah exclaimed.
Keeyana put her foot back onto the pedal and sped throughout the neighborhood in search of more puddles to shock us with. Due to the rain there were a lot of giant puddles that would crash onto the windows as we drove through them. It felt like I was on Splash Mountain, excluding getting splashed. We spent the rest of the night driving through huge puddles and laughing.