Passport & Plate - Phil Baba's Magnificent Pizza Pie
USA | Friday, March 14, 2014 | 5 photos
Ingredients
Ingredients:
A pizza crust, we use an Amy's frozen pizza crust (it saves preparation time) and prefer the Basil & Tomato kind; if you have the time to prepare a whole wheat crust, that is perfect
1 cup of wild brown rice - cooked
1/2 of a colorful (yellow, red, or orange) sweet pepper, cut into long slices
A handful of broccoli florets, sliced into smaller chunks
3 oz. of extra-firm tofu, sliced into 1/4" cubes
1 jar of your favorite salsa, we prefer peach mango or pineapple
Spinach or Kale, or a combination of both
8 slices of rice cheese, pepper jack is better, but mozzarella works well too
1 cup of Daiya Pepper Jack cheese (a vegan cheese made from tapioca flower)
Each time, we enjoy experimenting with the ingredients, always looking for some new exotic flavor to add to this culinary delight; here's a list of the ingredients we've used in the past:
Almonds
Cashews
Cranberries or dried cherries
Fresh mango - sliced
Star fruit
Broccoli
Mandarin oranges
Various kinds of wild rice
Sweet peppers
Tofu
Bananas
Kiwi
Orange
Avocado
Sugar snap peas
Apples
Quinoa as an alternative to wild rice
Basil
Tomatoes
Strawberries
Blueberries
How to prepare this recipe To prepare the pizza:
· First oil the pizza pan and place the frozen pizza crust on top; this will keep the crust from sticking to the pan when it is baked.
· Then scoop out the brown rice you cooked in a rice cooker and put a healthy layer on top of the pizza crust.
· Next place the slices of sweet peppers around the outside edge of the pizza, this helps to create a dike so that the other ingredients stay on top of the pizza as the pizza pie begins to grow in height.
· Once you have placed the sweet peppers, add the broccoli florets, tofu cubes, and sugar-snap peas.
· Next sprinkle cashews, almonds, and cranberries to taste.
· Now add a full-layer of sliced mangoes
· After the mangoes, build your layer of fruits (we typically use sliced banana and kiwi, and mandarin oranges)
· Once the pizza is nicely layered with fruits, veggies and nuts; carefully slather a jar of your favorite salsa over the top of these layers
· Add a healthy layer of fresh spinach and/or kale mixed together
· Then place 8 slices of pepper jack rice cheese around the pizza with the last slice on top. The slices of cheese help to hold all the ingredients together. This amazing pizza pie can grow up to 6 inches in height before cooking!
· And finally top off the pizza with a generous amount of shredded pepper jack tapioca cheese
Make sure to set the oven to 425 F degrees 10 minutes before you pop the pizza in the oven. Once the oven is nice and toasty place your pizza in the oven and set the timer for 25 minutes.
When you hear the ring of that timer go off, let your heart skip a beat! Your pizza is about ready to serve.
Take your pizza pie out of the oven, and get ready to drain all the yummy fluids from the fruits, veggies and salsa into the sink. This requires being careful and patient. Tilt the pizza pan and press the pizza gently with a spatula to make sure all the excess liquid comes out and does not make your pizza too mushy.
Finally cut the pizza into 6 slices. Start with a serrated-knife, cutting carefully through the layers of cheese on the top. Then take a pizza cutter and finish cutting through all the layers of fruit and veggies as well as the crust on the bottom. It’s a long-way down, the bigger the pizza cutter the better, but by now your pizza should have shrunk to about 3 or 4 inches.
Get plates, serve, and devour with your hands. It's messy, it's crunchy, sweet, cheesy and oh so good!
Each slice is a full-meal, each mouth-full is filled with delectable treasures; and it is so healthy for you.
Enjoy!
The story behind this recipeThe story behind Phil Baba’s Magnificent Pizza Pie
Don't you just love the scent of brown rice bubbling inside a rice cooker? How the aroma warms up even the coldest of winter struck homes amidst an endless snowstorm? Or adds to the comfort of a home in the Caribbean, where the sun sparkles amidst blue radiant skies asking you to take it easy, to slow down and enjoy the day.
Smell the scent of wild brown rice simmering on the stove or in a rice cooker; the sweet aroma envelops the kitchen until it reaches every corner of your home.
Then start looking around your kitchen and bring all your fruits and veggies out. Get ready for a real culinary experience.
Fill your counter with the myriads of colors that only vibrant fruits and vegetables can offer. Get them cleaned up as you prepare to peel, cut, slice, and dice them.
When you think of brown wild rice, fruits and vegetables the last thing on your mind is probably pizza, right?
This is exactly how I felt the first day I hung around the kitchen of my friend Phil baba's home in northern New York, in a small city more like a town, named Batavia.
In this small corner of the world, Phil Baba’s Magnificent Pizza Pie was born and has continued to evolve throughout the years.
I remember the first time I had it. I had just flown in from Afghanistan, where I worked with Afghan women who were working hard to establish small businesses in the arts and crafts sector. Phil and I had met in Kabul in December 2007, when he’d visited the Afghan women’s design center I was helping manage. He had flown all the way from Batavia to meet women artisans, hear their stories and help connect them to the US market through his fair trade company.
Phil is neither your typical guy nor your typical cook. He is not even that much into food himself, and tries to feed his mind, body and soul through the art of meditation. Back when he’d visited Kabul, he’d taken with himself a few handfuls of nuts and spent his ten-day trip eating these nuts and drinking water. He's a yogi who meditates many hours a day and spends his days serving others; his motto is "Uniting the World Through Compassionate Trade". On top of his spiritual journey, he started a fair trade business to promote handmade crafts from communities in need around the world over 22 years ago. And this is how we connected as we share the same passion, to support communities around the world through economic development projects, which enable them to establish successful businesses and be able to support their communities’ growth.
As Phil began importing handmade crafts made by Afghan women and I continued to work with the women as they worked hard to fulfill orders and learn more about the export market, our friendship grew. It was easy to see that Phil was on a defined path and spiritual journey. He quickly became one of my spiritual mentors and I spent many wonderful hours chatting over Skype, exchanging our views on life, God and service.
Given Phil’s calling in life of service, he always opened up his home for visitors from around the world who wanted to learn more about the US, the market, and how an importing fair trade business works. And this is partly the reason why he has continued to enjoy making his pizza pie for many years. Every time guests arrive, he thinks up of new ingredients for his pizza pie and all of us who are gifted in knowing him have come to know Fridays as pizza pie night. We all look forward to Fridays because we know the goodness that’s coming our way.
We call him baba, meaning father in many languages, like in India. As Phil’s spiritual practice is a meditation techniques from India, people from around the world call him Baba, and he really does love all of us with baba-like-love. Phil, as a yogi and vegan always seeks the most wholesome ingredients focusing on natural and organic food for his everyday living.
He never makes your average home cooked meal, and this pizza pie definitely crosses cultural and taste bud boundaries at once. As he hosts guests from all corners of the world, as remote as Afghanistan and Nepal and as close as other Batavians within the community, he always enjoys introducing them to his pizza pie. At first, most of us were skeptics, wrinkling our noses with the thought of a pizza made with tofu, kale, spinach, bananas and berries! Most of us had never heard of such toppings as choices for a pizza. However, time after time, once each of us have taken our first bite, there has been no stopping each one of us from devouring the 3-4 inch high pizza pie! It is simply a feast, an explosion of flavors that leaves you begging for more. It is wonderful to share with you his pizza pie recipe, which I know call, Phil Baba’s Magnificent Pizza.
I have had the privilege of preparing it side by side him, and have made it for my family in my home country, Honduras. Just as expected, they loved it!
The beauty of this pizza is that to make one yourself, you can look around your kitchen and make up your own combination of fruits and vegetables to form your pizza pie. This pizza is guaranteed to satisfy even the most demanding palates in your household.
To date there are many of us who love his pizza pie can make it ourselves, and always eat it with fond memories, always looking forward to a visit to his home in Batavia, to spend time with him, making sure to be there on a Friday, pizza pie day!
