Thursday, January 3, 2008

How to Make an Easy Diet Pizza Dough

Author: David

An inexpensive and simple food, Pizza is definitely the reason why Pizza parlours make so much money selling these slices of heaven. Although, Pizza is a meal you can create at home, and you do not have to buy and keep Pizza bases for when you get that craving.

If you surf the world wide web it’s easy to locate recipes and methods for creating all types of Pizza dough. Examples are; half wheat pizza dough, thin pizza dough, herby pizza dough, and the popular crispy pizza dough. Think of a dough crust, and someone probably makes it. Unfortunately most of those Pizza Dough Recipes need you to spend anywhere up to twenty-four hours to prepare. In my mind Pizza is only a convenience food if its fresh and quick, and in this case an easy diet Pizza recipe. Forward planning shouldn’t be a part of the experience. Kneading for ages and waiting patiently for it to ferment, no thanks! Thankfully I have a better way and best of all its an easy diet method.

When I get the craving for a Pizza, I can’t wait, but it’s got to be fresh, quick, low fat, low cal and high in stomach filling fibre! However, if dough mixture needs time to rise, how can it be made quickly? Well guess what, my recipe is speedy and simple to create in your very own kitchen, and you only need a few ingredients: olive oil, whole wheat flour, water, yeast, salt, and my secret ingredient (read on).

A technique in creating an easy Pizza dough fast, is using rapidly rising yeast. Using this special yeast has the ability to cut your pizza dough prep’ time from up to twenty-four hours to only thirty minutes. In that thirty minutes, you have the time to cut up and select all the toppings you would like on the Pizza, failing that just relax for 30 minutes, “chuckle“.

Step-by-Step Recipe:

1. You need one cup of hot tap water (not boiling). Get a large mixing bowl, pour the hot water in, and then add a teaspoon of salt and a packet of the rapid rising yeast. Mix it all together with a fork.

2. Slowly mix in 2 cups of whole wheat flour, and 1 tablespoon of my secret ingredient - powdered psyllium husk. The husk is tasteless and high in fibre. In the beginning, the mixture will combine quickly. Then the mixture will get too thick to use the fork, that’s when you start using your hands. It can get a little fiddly. If it gets a bit gooey, keep a little extra spare flour on the side.

3. When your kneading the dough it might stick to your hands, to prevent this dust the hands with the spare flour, then resume kneading the dough. Keep repeating the process until it forms a ball and it doesn’t stick. In an ideal world, you need to use as little extra flour as achievable to make this occur.

4. Now cover the outside of the dough ball with a tablespoon of olive oil, it just makes it a bit easier to handle. Get a clean kitchen towel and cover the dough ball, then leave for half an hour.

5. After 30 minutes roll out the dough ball with a rolling pin, roll it out on big baking sheet, or something equivalent like a pizza stone. When finally making this Pizza base it’s better to have the thin and crispy style, to achieve this make sure you roll it out as thin as practically possible. But don’t make it so thin if splits apart.

What make this an easy diet Pizza is the speed, high fibre, and comparatively lower calories. The combination of Psyllium husk and whole wheat flour adds lots of indigestible fibre making it filling and nutritious.

That’s all there is to it! Fast, easy diet Pizza dough that’s delicious.

Article Source: Articlesbase.com

About the Author:
David Allday is an ambitious British-born entrepreneur. A creative and enterprising author who enjoys writing articles on new solutions to old problems. Educated in Economics, Computers, and Business, David has a real passion for Diets, Health and Lifestyles. His mission is to make an innovative difference to peoples lives.

Friday, December 28, 2007

Can Pizza Be Part Of A Healthy Diet?

Author: Tracie Johanson

At any given time, approximately 65 million Americans are on a diet. As a nation we try every diet product that comes along, from diet pills to fat burner lotions to weight loss surgery. We attend Weight Watchers meetings for our weight loss support, and we seek out weight loss tips anywhere we can find them. We've tried the weight loss herbs, the Nicole Richie weight loss plan, and the fat flush diet. In other words, many Americans have tried every weight loss system on the market today.

Unfortunately, most people haven't yet written their own weight loss success story. Most people are seeking rapid weight loss through one method or another, yet almost two-thirds of our nation is still classified as overweight. About one-third of our population is clinically obese. Clearly, the average weight in the United States continues to rise just as fast as the number of crash diets advertised on television.

While it can certainly be argued that Americans don't exercise to lose weight nearly enough and rely too much on quick weight loss diets, it's also true that a healthy diet will can have a substantial impact on fat loss results.

Diet Dilemma:

Unfortunately, when most people consider weight loss nutrition they automatically think of low fat foods such as alfalfa sprouts, broccoli and nonfat cottage cheese. Just the thought of surviving on such meager fare leaves the dieter discouraged and disappointed. Unable to eat the foods they love, dieters give up all hope of achieving their spot on the ideal weight chart and revert to their old pre-diet dining habits.

That's where most diets fail. Consumers, seeking honest weight loss help, are led to believe that in order to reach their ideal body weight they absolutely must give up all the foods they love and enjoy. Not realizing that this diet information is dangerous and self-defeating, the average dieter attempts to ‘willpower' their way through day after tortuous day, denying themselves the very foods that they cherish the most. Such an approach almost never leads the consumer to a healthy weight because it's virtually impossible to deny yourself to this extreme. After the inevitable failure of this weight management technique, the dieter feels like a personal failure. Feelings of inadequacy set in, and it's easy to lose weight loss motivation altogether.

Thankfully, your weight loss story doesn't have to end here. An eminently better way to diet and lose fat is to make modifications to your menu that you can stick with for life. While it is possible to burn fat using the ‘willpower through it' method, weight loss success is much more likely when small (almost unnoticeable) changes are made.

Americans Consume Piles Of Pizza:

Pizza is a perfect example of how you can make a minor modification to your diet, without giving up the foods you adore, and still attain some healthy weight loss. "Americans spent more than $22 billion last year on pizza, according to ‘The Pizza Market' study conducted by Packaged Facts, a market research company. Helping to drive this trend is what many refer to as "consumers' growing love affair" with frozen pizza. About 7.7% of total dollars spent for pizza in 1995 was for frozen pizza, and growing sales are being spurred by the new rising crust varieties." (Source: Baking Business; 11-26-1996).

Most pizzas will do little to help your fast weight loss diet because they're typically loaded down with high-fat toppings like cheese and pepperoni. As an example, Pizza Hut claims that "If all the cows it takes to produce Pizza Hut cheese stood end to end, they would span the distance between the international space station and Earth at its point closest to the planet (333 kilometers or 207 miles)" (Source: Pizza Hut).

As a nation, our love affair with pizza has hindered our weight control efforts. Each man, woman and child in America eats an average of 46 slices (23 pounds) of pizza a year (Source: Packaged Facts, New York). A look at the Pizza Hut menu reveals that a single (100 gram) slice of Pizza Hut pan pizza (pepperoni) has 280 calories. That same slice at Domino's Pizza will cost you 310 calories. A single (153 gram) slice of Papa John's Pizza (The Meats) checks in at a whopping 430 calories, while a slice of pepperoni (111 grams) at Round Table Pizza boasts 310 calories. Finally, a (141 gram) deep-dish pepperoni slice from Little Caesars will set you back 350 calories.

Can Pizza Be Part Of A Healthy Diet?

With all those calories in pizza, and the pizza delivery truck just a phone call away, your diet and nutrition plan may be in jeopardy. But it doesn't have to be. The incredible pizza served up at your favorite pizza restaurant doesn't have to derail your weight loss plan. While the local pizza franchise won't ever be mistaken for the neighborhood quick weight loss center, and pizza probably won't ever qualify as a fat burning food, you don't have to give it up entirely in favor of the latest fad diet.

Many Americans are finding that their local pizza place is now offering healthier choices. With consumers concerned about so many carbs in pizza (due to the Atkins Diet and the South Beach Diet), and with high fat foods still a concern for many, pizza recipes are changing for the better.

Papa Murphy's deLITE Pizza May Fit Your Diet Plan:

Papa Murphy's Pizza is a fine example of a company that has listened to the customer and now offers a diet recipe on its pizza menu. Aware that many people are on a low-carb diet and weight loss program, Papa Murphy's has adjusted their pizza dough recipe accordingly. The result is their deLITE line of pizzas, where a slice of pepperoni will cost you only 160 calories. Mindful of the millions of Americans on a low carbohydrate diet, Papa Murphy's has cut back on the crust while preserving the flavor. Even the Papa Murphy's equivalent of the big sausage pizza, which they call the Meat DeLITE, has just 190 calories.

With their Cheese DeLITE pizza boasting only 140 calories per slice, and the Veggie DeLITE pizza coming in at just 150 calories per slice, we may assume that the pizza ovens at Papa Murphy's are working overtime!

So, Can Pizza Be Part Of A Healthy Diet?

While a steady diet of pizza will never be the next Weight Watcher diet, and the local pizza restaurant will never be a weight loss clinic, it is not unreasonable to claim that the Papa Murphy's deLITE line of pizzas can indeed be a valuable part of our diet and exercise program.

Traditional diets promising easy weight loss demand that the dieter forfeit their favorite foods. More often than not, such diet programs include giving up pizza. Such drastic actions are often a direct path to failure, leaving the dieter with a weight issue they cannot handle and a monumental feeling of failure.

A much better approach to any weight loss diet is making small but significant changes that the dieter can stick to for life. One such change is making a switch from regular high-fat, high-calorie pizza to the Papa Murphy's DeLITE line. Based upon a comparison to Papa John's (see above), substituting the Papa Murphy's DeLITE pizza will save you 290 calories per slice. Keeping in mind that the average American consumes 46 slices of pizza annually, the potential caloric savings is 13,340 calories per year. That's almost four pounds of fat that can be shed each and every year simply by switching to the DeLITE pizza!

Is the DeLITE pizza a guaranteed way to lose weight fast? Is the DeLITE pizza a diet food or even a low fat option? Of course not. But it will help most dieters stay on their plan, and thus gives them a higher probability of achieving their ideal weight. So while it's not a good idea to go into a pizza frenzy just yet, the DeLITE pizzas from Papa Murphy's may indeed be part of your healthy diet.

Article Source: articlesbase.com

About the Author:
Tracie Johanson is the founder of Pick Up The Pace, a 30-minute exercise studio for women focusing on fitness, health and nutrition for maximum weight loss. Please visit http://www.letspickupthepace.com/ for more information.