Spinach and Artichoke Pizza

In Chicago there was this magical place called Homemade Pizza. You could get all sorts of fun and delicious toppings on a yummy thin crust – and then bake it at home! My favorite was the Georgia, Charlie’s was the Buffalo Chicken (gross). Anyway, since relocating to sunny California, I have been craving Homemade Pizza like crazy! I had never made a real home-made pizza before so I was kind of apprehensive about the dough/baking instrument/ingredients/toppings… everything. After all thirteen of our boxes showed up… (Yes – we packed our entire life into two cars and thirteen boxes) I found Charlie’s old pizza baking tray and felt inspired! I searched for pizza recipes and found this one on Real Simple. I changed some of the ingredients/steps… but it turned out AMAZING! Like Meryl Streep Amazing.

Enjoy! 🙂

Spinach and Artichoke Pizza

• 1 lb pizza dough at room temperature
• 1 1/2 cups quattro formaggio (mixture of yummy cheeses of your choice!)
• 4 oz light cream cheese
• 1 1/2 T olive oil
• 1 1/2 cups marinated artichoke hearts
• 2 cups spinach
• salt and pepper

Instructions:

1. Form pizza dough into a 12-inch circle on a floured surface. (Note: This is a pain in the biz-utt, make sure the dough is at room temperature – I had to use a rolling pin and a whole lot of perseverance).
2. Place pizza form onto a baking sheet (with corn meal on the bottom) or pizza pan.
3. Spread olive oil over crust – sprinkle salt and pepper.
4. Break cream cheese into small pieces and place on oiled crust.
5. Sprinkle 3/4 cup cheese over cream cheese and oil.
6. Quarter artichoke hearts and spread over pizza.
7. Cover pizza with spinach.
8. Sprinkle remaining cheese over pizza. (Feel free to add more cheese – you can never have enough!) 🙂
9. Bake at 450 degrees for 25 minutes.

Things I will try next time!

• Cooking the crust for a little bit prior to dressing it up. (Charlie says this will make it crispier!)
• Moooore artichokes. Yummy!!
• Spreading the cream cheese over the pizza dough evenly before adding olive oil and other toppings!