In The Bag: May is Broccoli and Blue Cheese

ITB: MAY hosted this month by Scott at Real Epicurean.  Check out the site to see what is going on in his neck of the woods.  He has chosen Broccoli and Blue Cheese as our key ingredients for May. 

Nothing else came to mind except Broccoli Blue Cheese Bread.  It works as a great appetizer for cocktail parties, picnics, you name it.  It’s easy and full of flavor. 

Don’t let the “bread” part fool you.  The dough is Pizza dough.  A very easy recipe for which a bread machine was used to do all the hard labor.

The blue cheese should be a milder tasting blue cheese otherwise it will overwhelm the broccoli.  The broccoli and cheese should share in the “staring roll” and one should not drown out the other. 

PIZZA DOUGH (using a bread machine).  Add the following to your machine and set to “Dough” cycle.

• 3/4 cup water
• 1 TBS olive oil
• 1 TBS sugar
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 TBS Dry Milk Powder
• 2 1/4 cup Bread Flour
• 1 tsp yeast

BROCCOLI BLUE CHEESE BREAD

• 1 lb of Pizza Dough (recipe above)
• 2 crowns of broccoli, chopped
• 1/4 lb Mild Blue Cheese
• 2 TBS chopped Sun Dried Tomatoes packed in oil
• 1 TBS Italian Spices (such as basil, oregano….)
• 2 egg whites
• garlic powder

Preheat oven to 350 F.

Place washed broccoli in salted water and boil until softened.  Drain and pat dry completely.

Flour a baking sheet and spread out the pizza dough to cover the sheet. Make sure there are no holes.  Drizzle a little olive oil on top of dough.  Leaving about 1 inch from the edge of dough, spread your cooked broccoli.  Crumble your blue cheese on top of the broccoli, followed by your chopped sun dried tomatoes.  Sprinkle on a tablespoon of your Italian spices. 

On the long side, begin rolling up and at about 1/2 way, fold the ends in and continue rolling.  Flip the roll over so the seam is on the bottom.  Brush egg white on top and sprinkle on garlic powder.

Bake for 30 – 35 minutes until nice and brown.