As many of you know, I live in Washington DC, and was thus part of the country that got to frantically prepare for Hurricane Sandy last weekend. Luckily, we ended up only getting strong winds and rain, but not before I stocked up on water and food.  To get prepared for the storm, we got up early last weekend and went to Trader Joe’s. Upon walking in the store, I was immediately overwhelmed because the line was even longer than usual and things were clearly selling out. While Dave got in line, I ended up running around and grabbing whatever food I could find that seemed like good “storm food.” This ended up involving the fixings for homemade pizza (I decided to assume that I’d at least have power long enough to bake the pizza).

Trader Joe’s has a couple different pizza crust options, but I think the one with basil and garlic is the best!  We also got pesto, bacon, pepperoni, peppers, spinach, zucchini, and onions to throw on top. Because we had no clue when our power would go out (or that we would actually not ever lose it), we made two large pizzas as soon as we got home so that we could have lots of leftovers to eat cold if we found ourselves sitting in the dark.

Homemade pizza on a day when it is gross out is so delicious. Especially when it only takes about 20 minutes to prepare, and 10-20 minutes to cook.

A few preparation notes:

• We sauteed the peppers and zucchini for a few minutes before throwing them on.
• We caramelized the onions in a saute pan on the stove before adding them (this takes a while but so worth it).
• We fully cooked the bacon on the stovetop before putting it on the pizza.
• We also bought Semolina flour to spread on the counter. You can then spread the dough on top, which helps it to cook better and not stick to the counter and pan.
• We have a pizza stone (well actually I gave it to Dave for Christmas- great job on my part) and this really helps the pizza cook well. Totally recommend getting one. I got ours from Sur La Table. And turns out, they are great. Ours cracked and they immediately replaced it free of charge. You can find the basic model here.