Colorful salad pizza is a meal in one

I had a new kitchen utensil and was eager to use it. My daughter had been to a party that featured cooking gadgets and had bought for me a chopping instrument to smooth out ground meat or turkey crumbles (see below). Accompanying my purchase was a featured recipe. Hubby and I were keeping the grandmunchkin over the weekend; I knew he liked pizza. I thought this salad pizza would be a good way to encourage his veggie intake.

It encouraged the rest of us as well. Wow, what a great dish—and an easy one. Refrigerated roll dough formed the crust. After browning the dough in the oven the cook piles on a sour-cream layer and then a cooked ground turkey mixture that has been stirred with salsa and seasonings; then the healthy toppings. After the crust nothing else gets baked. A wonderful, colorful meal is ready in minutes. 

Mexican Fiesta Salad Pizza

2 packages (8-ounces each) refrigerator crescent rolls

1 1/4 pound lean ground turkey

1 1/4 cups medium thick and chunky salsa

1 (1-ounce) envelope taco seasoning mix

1 clove garlic, pressed

1 cup sour cream (I used fat-free)

2 cups thinly sliced iceberg lettuce

2 plum tomatoes, seeded and diced

2 green onions with tops, thinly sliced

1/2 cup shredded cheddar cheese

1/4 cup pitted ripe olives, coarsely chopped

additional salsa (optional)

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Unroll crescent dough; separate into 16 triangles. Arrange 14 of the triangles in a circle on lightly floured round baking stone (I used a regular, rectangular cookie sheet) with wide ends even with edge of baking stone and points toward the center. Place the remaining two triangles in the center; pinch seams to seal. Roll dough to create a smooth surface. Bake 15 to 18 minutes or until dough is golden brown. Remove from oven; cool completely. In 12-inch skillet, cook ground turkey over medium heat 10-12 minutes or until it no longer is pink. Break turkey into crumbles. (Recipe recommends using a Mix ’n Chop cooking utensil that is sold by the recipe source, The Pampered Chef.) Drain if necessary. In a medium bowl combine salsa, seasoning mix, and garlic; mix well. Add to turkey in skillet; toss to coat. Spread sour cream over crust. Spoon turkey mixture over sour cream. Top with lettuce, tomatoes, onions, cheese, and olives. Serve immediately with additional salsa, if desired. Makes 8 servings. (Source: The Pampered Chef.)

Red-leaf lettuce on a pizza? You can bet the garden on it.

We just couldn’t get enough of our very own, garden-grown red-leaf lettuce, so I dug out another recipe that would assure that I’d be dining on it for the next several days.

For more than a year I’d just been staring at my torn-out Prevention magazine page that gave the directions for Salad Pizza. I just couldn’t fathom it—salad atop golden-brown pizza crust? As my hubby remarked when he bit into this entree last evening, “Are you sure this thing doesn’t have meat on it?” At the outset I puzzled over the same matter. Except for browning the pizza dough in an oven for 8 minutes, the resulting “pizza” wasn’t even warmed. How did this work?

Yet Prevention vowed that a somewhat sizable helping of the pizza contained only 410 calories even when served with a 5-ounce glass of red wine (in our case, a 5-ounce glass of sparkling red grape juice.) And our wonderful fresh lettuce formed the base of it all.

Besides enjoying dining on more of the lettuce, Hubby liked the finished product because it called for 1/4-cup walnuts sprinkled over it. No one can deny that the walnut is the Grand Pooh-Bah of cholesterol-lowering nuts—supposedly even better for a person than the more tasty almonds, pecans, or pistachios. But walnuts seem bitter and bland to me. I go for the tastier but less power-packed nut snacks.

In this melange, however, the walnuts are sprinkled on as pizza toppings alongside feta cheese, tomatoes, green onions, and the like, so they absorb the flavors of that which is around them. Walnuts provided a crunch to the topping that made this dish all the more unusual.

Dining on this amazing pizza made us sad we hadn’t planted more red-leaf lettuce; it’ll be gone all too soon, but my new, memorable recipe for Salad Pizza will prompt us to put in more lettuce rows next year.

Salad Pizza

1 13-ounce package refrigerated pizza dough (tested with Pillsbury brand)

2 cups torn red-leaf lettuce

3 Roma tomatoes, chopped

1/2 diced small red onion

4 ounces crumbled feta cheese

1/4 cup chopped walnuts

1/4 cup chopped green onion

2 tablespoons dried herbs (I used a mixture of Italian seasoning and parsley)

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar

1/4 teaspoon salt (or salt substitute)

On nonstick baking sheet pat pizza dough into a thin circle or rectangle. Bake according to package directions. Let cool. Top with torn lettuce, tomatoes, onion, cheese, walnuts, green onion, and herbs. Combine olive oil, balsamic vinegar, and salt substitute. Drizzle over entire pizza topping. Makes 4 servings.