Pizza with Potatoes -- It Works!

I've been wanting to put potatoes on pizza for quite some time now. I did it last night and really loved the taste and texture of creamy soft potatoes along with the mushrooms, kale and bits of seasoned tofu crumbles.

The potatoes here don't look especially attractive, I'll admit -- I might have turned the broiler on for a minute or two to brown them up. But the taste was just right.

Because I have an unreasonable fear of using yeast, I don't make pizza dough from scratch. Once or twice in the past, I had bread dough that didn't rise and ever since then, I hesitate to try using it again.  (You think maybe because the yeast was over 10 years old?) So instead of making pizza dough myself, I buy frozen dough from the grocery. (Click here for my last pizza with frozen dough.)

Here's my recipe:

Slice one Yukon Gold potato into 1/8-inch slices and stand them on end around a wire steamer basket.  Cook them until tender. Lay the slices on a dish towel to absorb excess moisture, turning them once.

Remove the stems from about four large kale leaves and wash the leaves. Chop the kale and sauté it for two or three minutes. Add two cloves of chopped or minced garlic and continue cooking for two to three more minutes. 

Sauté about three large mushrooms, sliced. I used to use uncooked mushrooms when making pizza, but my pizza was always way too juicy, because I'm not shy about using lots of mushrooms. So now I cook the mushrooms briefly, just until they release most of their liquid and the problem is solved.

Sauté about 3/4-cup of tofu crumbles with 1 tbsp. of fennel seeds and 1 tsp. each of cumin seeds or ground cumin, sage and thyme along with a sprinkling of crushed red pepper, salt and pepper.

Layer the ingredients on the pizza beginning with mozzarella. I skipped tomato sauce with this pizza because I wanted the flavors of the other ingredients to be prominent.

Add a drizzle of olive oil, sprinkle salt and pepper over everything and bake at 450 degrees for about 20 minutes.