This recipe is taken from the July 2014 edition of BBC Good Food magazine, and I’ve used our tried-and-tested recipes for the pizza dough and pesto. The magazine says to use half a quantity of dough for 2 pizzas, so you could make some rolls with the rest of it or make thicker pizzas if you’d rather. It also says that you can cook this on a barbecue – but to be honest, living in Newcastle means that we don’t really get to have one very often…! So I’ve adapted this recipe to be cooked in an oven.

Ingredients (serves 4, makes 2 pizzas)

For the pizza dough
400g strong white bread flour
1 sachet quick yeast
1 tsp salt
2 tbsp olive oil
300ml hand hot water (150ml cold topped up with 150ml boiling water)

For the pesto
60g fresh basil leaves
50g pine nuts
1 garlic clove, peeled
130ml olive oil
Zest of an unwaxed lemon
Salt and pepper to taste

For the topping
1 small aubergine, thinly sliced lengthways
1 medium red onion, thickly sliced
2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
75g/2 1/2oz firm goat’s cheese (I used Snofrisk goat’s cheese from Waitrose)
Chilli flakes (optional)
Basil leaves, to serve

Method

1. To make the dough, mix all of the dry ingredients together in a bowl. Add the oil to the water before pouring over the dry ingredients. Mix together until a dough is formed and then knead for five minutes.

2. Leave the dough in the bowl. Wet a clean tea towel with cold water and wring out so that it isn’t dripping, before placing over the bowl. Leave to rise.

3. Whilst the dough is rising, prepare the pesto. Place the basil, pine nuts and garlic in a food processor. Add the olive oil and blitz until smooth, before mixing in the lemon zest. Place in the fridge (covered) until needed.

4. When the dough has at least doubled in size, ‘knock back’ and knead again for a few minutes. Roll it out to fit a large, greased baking tray (use a bit of olive oil to grease the tray). Heat the oven to 220°c/425°F/Gas mark 7 whilst preparing the topping.

5. Heat some olive oil in a pan and then cook the aubergines until browned on each side (you could do this on a griddle if you have one, but we don’t!). You’ll need to do this in batches, so placed the cooked ones on some kitchen paper to drain.

6. When the aubergines are cooked, add a little more oil to the pan and then cook the onion until softened. Spread some pesto onto the pizza base and then add the aubergine, onion and goat’s cheese (broken into chunks). Add some chilli flakes if you want a bit of a kick!

7. Bake in the oven for 15-20 minutes and then serve with the basil leaves sprinkled over.

Enjoy!

The goat’s cheese that we used for the pizza worked so well with the other flavours – and apparently the goats are fed on mountain grass in the fjords, so they must be super happy goats! You might not need to use all of the pesto, but it keeps in the fridge for up to 5 days, so you could use the rest another time. If you’d rather have a tomato base on your pizza, try making your own low-fat tomato sauce!

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I tried out this recipe this evening and it’s really easy, really tasty and low fat – brilliant! I halved the quantities here for the two of us, except for the 400g tin of chopped tomatoes. I think next time I’d put a whole chilli in for 2 people, but that’s just personal preference! I used linguine here, which was slightly on the done side because we were trying to rescue a butterfly…

This recipe comes from the July 2014 edition of BBC Good Food magazine.

Ingredients (serves 4)

2 tbsp olive oil
1 large aubergine, cut into bite-sized pieces
1 small onion, finely chopped
2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
1 red chilli, deseeded and finely chopped
1 tsp dried oregano
400g/14oz fresh tomatoes, roughly chopped (or a 400g tin of chopped tomatoes)
1 tbsp balsamic vinegar
400g/14oz dried tagliolini pasta (we used linguine)
Small bunch of basil, roughly chopped
50g/2oz pecorino, grated (or veggie alternative)

Method

1. Heat the olive oil in a large saucepan and cook the aubergine for 5 minutes until starting to brown and soften.

2. Add the onion, garlic, chilli and oregano and cook for just a few minutes. Add the tomatoes, balsamic vinegar and about 200ml water, then reduce the heat and simmer gently for about 20 minutes until the tomatoes are reduced and the sauce is thickened.

3. Meanwhile, bring a large pan of water to the boil and cook the tagliolini following the pack instructions. Drain the pasta and return to the pan. Add the sauce and toss well into the pasta with the basil. Serve with the grated pecorino.

Enjoy!

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We had some leftover ricotta cheese after making our Butternut and sweet potato lasagne with sage, toasted pine nuts and nutmeg and so I decided to use the recipe finder on the BBC Food website to see if I could find a recipe to use it up. This is what I found – a recipe by Simon Rimmer that is easy to make but really delicious.

Ingredients

For the filling
400g/14oz aubergines, sliced into thin rounds
50ml/2oz vegetable oil
salt and freshly ground black pepper
1 red onion, finely chopped
1 red pepper, finely chopped
1 garlic clove, finely chopped
50g/2oz tomato purée
400g/14oz canned chopped tomatoes, drained
1 cinnamon stick
100g/3½oz red lentils, cooked according to packet instructions
2 tbsp chopped fresh parsley

For the topping
125g/4½oz ricotta
125g/4½oz Greek-style yoghurt
3 free-range eggs
freshly grated nutmeg
salt and freshly ground black pepper
50g/2oz freshly grated pecorino

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 180C/350F/Gas 4.

2. For the filling, toss the aubergine slices in the vegetable oil, then drain and season, to taste, with salt and freshly ground black pepper.

3. Heat a frying pan over a medium heat, add the aubergine slices in batches and fry for 2-3 minutes on each side, or until golden-brown on both sides. Remove from the pan with a slotted spoon and set aside to drain on kitchen paper.

4. Add the onion, pepper and garlic to the pan and fry for 2-3 minutes, or until softened.

5. Add the tomato purée, stir to coat the vegetables in it, then continue to fry for a further 4-5 minutes.

6. Add the canned chopped tomatoes and cinnamon stick and simmer for 4-5 minutes.

7. Add the lentils and return the fried aubergines to the mixture. Simmer for a further 2-3 minutes, or until warmed through.

8. Transfer the mixture to an ovenproof dish and sprinkle over the chopped parsley.

9. For the topping, in a bowl, beat together the ricotta, Greek-style yoghurt, eggs and grated nutmeg until well combined. Season, to taste, with salt and freshly ground black pepper.

10. Pour the topping mixture into the ovenproof dish on top of the filling. Sprinkle over the grated pecorino. Transfer the veggie moussaka to the oven and bake for 25-30 minutes, or until the topping is golden-brown and has set and the filling is bubbling. Serve immediately and enjoy!

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