Veggie pizza

I sense an impending mutiny arising from 5 continuous days of Asian food ,rice meals specifically. Having gone through a complete week with Basmatic , Japanese short grain, brown rice, Thai fragrant and multi-grains , rice fatigue is causing certain factions to crave for bread.

And thus, out of extreme necessity comes the perennial crowd pleaser, pizza. This time, I decided to go "vegetarian" because the ham/pineapple combo is looking overly tired and springs little surprises. Asparagus and pizza may make strange bed fellows but its harmony with the peppers and earthy mushrooms is unbelievable. Coupled with pizza sauce, it gives an explosion of taste in the mouth with every bite.

For best results, do not forget to blanch the vegetables or nuke them in the microwave for a minute and drain juices before use.

Makes for 4.

Pizza dough :
1/2 T sugar
1 t dried yeast
225g bread flour
100 ml warm water
1/4 t salt
1 1/2 T olive oil

Topping :

1 cup each of sliced brown mushroom, red peppers, trimmed asparagus (microwave for 1 minute). Drain moisture and set aside to cool.

1 handful of Parmesan cheese, grated
1 T chopped blue cheese

300g shredded mozarella cheese

Put all the dough ingredients in the bread machine and set it to dough mode. Retrieve after 1 1/2 hour. Roll the dough and leave it on the pizza tray for about 15 minutes.

Preheat the oven to 240 C.

Spread pizza sauce on the dough. Sprinkle mozzarella cheese and arrange the vegetables on the dough. Grate parmesan cheese over the vegetables and add a smattering of blue cheese.

Bake pizza for 13-15 minutes until the pizza is slightly browned. Serve immediately. Goes well with a hot bowl of minestrone soup and a dollop of premium sour cream.