Tuesday, January 24, 2012

Low-Calorie WHAT?!

WHO WANTS PIZZA?! Okay, okay! Settle down! Let's just jump right into it since this is PIZZA we're talking about! I'm going to set this up like a buffet so you can figure out your own calories, k?

Toppings-
1 tomato, sliced- 22
1 red onion, sliced- 40
1 jalapeno, sliced- 4
1 artichoke, boiled without sin- 64
1 (7.5oz) jar artichoke- 200
2 cups fresh infant spinach- 14
1 medium cucumber, peeled- 24
Olives, pitted- there are roughly 25 calories in 4 olives (olives require math!)
1 cup broccoli, chopped- 30
1/4 cup fresh basil- 1 (yep! 1 calorie!)
1 medium green bell pepper- 30
1 medium summer squash (any variety), peeled- 31
1 cup mushrooms, chopped- 15

Evil Toppings (Vegans and Vegetarians, you may procede to the sauce section)-
1 cup feta cheese (like anyone could choke down that much!)- 396
1 cup mozzarella cheese- 320
16 paper thin red dead animal circles- 140 (double check the epitaph on the back of the package for acuracy)
1 lb sweet Italian ground dead piggy- 1020

Sauce-
You have two options- traditional (red) or Pif's favorite (garlic butter). This is going to be tricky to figure out since there are gajillions of different brands... SOOO, what I'm gonna do is post a link to a recipe to  make your own! You can either follow that or buy a premade can/jar of sauce and figure out your calorie intake...but NO cheating!!
Red sauce- http://lowcaloriecooking.about.com/od/saucesandgravy/r/Pizza-Sauce.htm
You see where it says "1/4 tsp Sin"? Just ignore that part! You won't miss the taste and the Pope will thank you for it!
Here's a quick recipe for garlic butter sauce if you are like me and turn your nose up at that red crap-

1/3 cup butter or margarine (Vegans, watch your magic powers here!)
1 clove garlic, minced or crushed (I use more than this usually but I'll keep it tame for now)
2 tsps dried oregano
2 tsps dried basil

Melt the butter, mix everything together and voila! Awesome Sauce that weighs in at about 549 calories (for the whole pizza, mind you! Less if you halve it and make two pizzas! It's like, buy one get one free!)

Ok, now here's the tricky part! THE CRUST! You have endless options here! I encourage you to check the nutrition panel on the back of any packaged crusts you choose, as I am not there to do it for you. But here's another smorgasbord of ideas-

Pillsbury canned Thin Pizza crust (found by the biscuits)- 900 calories (for the whole thing) 180 if you can manage to eat just 1/5 of it (I can't).
Boboli 12" Whole Wheat Pizza crust- 720 (180 for a quarter of the pizza)
One large flour tortilla- 280
One medium pita bread- 124
One slice Italian Flatbread Focaccia- 180
One large slice of Italian bread (slice, NOT LOAF)- 81
One cup whole wheat pasta (if you want a casserole instead)- 210
One Asiago Cheese bagel- 330

So, what you choose as your crust will make a big difference on your caloric intake. I listed several 'single serving' options for you since pizza toppings can turn into an all out brawl when it comes to agreeing amongst friends/family members. If you go with one of the multi-serving crusts, I highly suggest you figure out your calories first, cut that bad boy in servings according to what you want to feed yourself, and force others to devour the rest OR wrap it up tight and store it in a bank vault BEFORE you begin eating! I know I can't have it laying around my house or I manage to trip and fall on it mouth first while walking by.

Here's a sample of a Pif Pizza-
Focaccia crust- 180
2 Tbs Awesome Sauce- 140
jalapeno slices- 2
1/4 cup mushrooms- 4 (I round up)
1/4 red onion, chopped- 10
1/4 tomato, sliced- 5.5
1/4 cup spinach- 2 (rounded up)

Total- 343.5

Have fun assembling your custom pizza and let me know what combinations are your favorites!

1 comment:

  1. I could totally eat a cup of feta cheese. I love that stuff!

    ReplyDelete