Great little flatbread from not so good restaurant.
Normally I don’t complain about food I get in a restaurant. Well, maybe I do if it isn’t good; but I haven’t emailed this hotel yet and probably won’t because even though the service was kind of good and chef couldn’t really manage to get more than one order out at a time out, I came away this this idea for a flatbread pizza.
The night before we left for our Turks and Caicos vacation we decided to spend the night down in Houston since our flight was at 6:30 am. If we didn’t go down early that would have meant getting up like at 3:00 a.m. to get down there for our flight. We stayed at a hotel that didn’t have a restaurant and since we had Ubered down there we didn’t have a car and we ended up walking down the street to the Hilton Garden Inn for dinner. GA’s tuna bowl was well done instead of medium rare and arrived about 10 minutes before my Asian salad that tasted nothing like an Asian salad BUT we ordered a flatbread to share for an appetizer and it was the best thing I have tasted in a long time.
So what was this flatbread pizza. Well the crust might have been a little thinner than my Stonewall flatbread (the people who make naan bread). The crust was covered with a roasted garlic cream sauce (I have a quick alternative), sautéed or roasted mushrooms, fontina and parmesan cheese and the absolute best part was crispy kale pieces on top. It was also garnished with Fresno peppers which look like red jalapeños. They happen to be like $5.00 for a carton of about 5 so if you don’t want to spend that much on a garnish maybe put a few strips of roasted red pepper or even some strips of sun-dried tomatoes. I tore the kale up in small pieces and the next time I will put 2 – 3 times the amount of kale I used on my first try.
Ok, for my easy hack, why not try a small jar of alfredo sauce that you buy in the pasta section. You don’t need a whole jar and could always freeze the leftovers for your next flatbread. I will make this again for sure and maybe try making my own flatbread the next time since I have made just about every other kind of bread.
BLAST FROM THE PAST: This Thai Tuna Won Ton Chip is a quick little appetizer and if you keep a piece of tuna in your freezer it will be easy to throw together.
All the ingredients for a delicious pizza
Saute the mushrooms in about 1 tablespoon of olive oil
Grate the fontina cheese and slice the Fresno peppers very thin.
Top with Fontina cheese and parmesan.
Top with the kale pieces and Fresno peppers.
Kale and Mushroom Flatbread
Ingredients
- 1 pkg. flatbread*
- 1 carton mushrooms sliced
- 1 Tbs. olive oil
- 3 c. fresh kale stems removed and roughly chopped
- 8 oz. or more fontina cheese grated
- freshly grated parmesan cheese
- Fresno peppers* sliced thinly
- 1 Tbsp. balsamic vinegar
- 1/2 tsp. dried thyme
Garlic White Sauce
- 1 c. whole milk
- 2 Tbsp. butter
- 2 Tbsp. flour
- 1/4 tsp. salt
- 1/4 tsp. cayenne pepper
- 4 large cloves garlic roasted if you have it.
Instructions
- Prebake the flatbread for about 5 minutes at 450°.
- Heat the milk in a small saucepan to a simmer. Remove from heat.
- In another saucepan, melt the butter then add the garlic and flour and stir until smooth and the flour looses it's raw (uncooked taste). Cook for 1-2 minutes longer stirring constantly to make a roux but do not let the flour brown. Gradually whisk in the warm milk to combine with flour. Add the salt and cayenne and increase heat to medium. Cook the mixture until the sauce starts to thicken. Place in bowl to cool then cover and place in refrigerator until ready to make the flatbread.
- For pizza.
- Saute the mushrooms in the one tablespoon of olive oil then add the balsamic vinegar, thyme and pinch of salt and pepper.
- Spread the flatbread with some of the white sauce, then top with the cooked mushrooms and then sprinkle with the fontina and parmesan. Top the flatbread pizza with pieces of kale and bake at 450 for 10-15 minutes.
Recipe Notes
You can either make your own flatbread, use some naan or buy flatbread ready made and all you have to do is brown a little. Also, the Fresno peppers are a little expensive so you can either use a red jalapeño or use a few slivers of roasted red peppers. You can also use fig preserves in place of the cream sauce and sage, crushed red pepper and goat cheese in place of the fontina.
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