PIZZA! PIZZA! PIZZA!!!

I'm a busy woman.  I have my own photography business that has taken off like wild fire...I have 5 kids.  Yes, they are mostly grown, but they still keep me hoppin.

And I love to cook.  But I don't love to bake.  UGH.

And I love a short cut...anything that will get the dinner to the table faster. So when I make Pizza, I buy a prepared pizza crust mix.  and while I generally hate Walmart, they DO have a great pizza crust mix.  It's the Great Value brand, and it's in the aisle with the tomato sauce, pasta, Boboli pizza crusts.  It comes in a package and it cost $.47 a piece.  can't beat that!

So this is 2 packages of crust mix, with 1 cup of VERY hot water, to activate the yeast. Mix with a fork, set it out on a lightly floured surface and let it rest a minute. Then I knead it for about 2 minutes.

Stretch it out on a round pizza pan. I don't know what size pan it is...just a "normal" sized pizza pan, sprayed with a little nonstick spray.

So my first pizza is a baked potato pizza, with bacon and green onion. Yes, POTATO. Trust me, if you are a carb lover like I am, you'll love this. So I baked about 3 medium sized potatoes in the microwave, cooked up 1 lb of bacon till crisp. the REAL stuff, none of that fake turkey crap. Real bacon, If you're gonna eat it, then eat the good stuff, ya know?

So I take some ranch salad dressing as my "sauce". Spread that on the crust and add some shredded cheese. Any kind of cheese you have on hand, doesn't really matter. cheese is cheese!!!!! This was a very sharp cheddar.

slice up the potatoes and place on the crust. I like to add some salt and pepper at this time.

top with your crisp bacon and chopped green onion and bake. simple as that!

The next pizza is just a plain old veggie pizza. I used zucchini, tomatoes, purple onion, and a can of artichoke hearts. If I have some fresh mushrooms, I add those too, or even a can of mushrooms. Frozen chopped spinach is good too, thawed and all the water squeezed out.

this time my sauce is a small amount of ranch and a whole heck of a lot of bottled pesto! Classico makes a great one.

Top with some thinly sliced zucchini.

add your fresh sliced tomatoes. I slice mine and let them sit on a couple of paper towels, to help absorb the juice, so the crust doesn't get soggy. Add the chopped onion, and the drained can of artichoke hearts. YUM.

This is the baked potato pizza. believe me, this doesn't last 5 minutes in my house. we are some major carb lovers around here.

This is the veggie. Simple and easy to make and very filling. You can add a simple salad on the side, and a nice homemade Dego Red....good stuff.