Cute!

Now I know why I make pizza at home and it will cost about a dollar to do so!!!

-Grainlady

pretty cool idea! I rarely go out for pizza, I make it at home also

That's fun. Someone posted The Petite Chef that entertains you on your table while you wait for your food.

cool

This is awful! They wouldn't even need to speak to one another. Or look at one another. Bet they continue to play games while they eat. Some date this is!

Love it. Very cool.

They are speaking to one another while they order. Actually interacting a lot since they are doing the picking, choosing and ordering together together. If the "table" became an electronic game board they would still be interacting. More so than calling in a pizza and watching TV or a movie.

Grainlady I am shocked you can make a pizza for only $1! You must not use a lot of toppings.

Very cool!

The couple in the promo spoke, but they didn't need to do so to place the order. Point and click. The table DOES become a game board after the order is placed, so they can play a game, not get to know one another. This is another barrier to social skills for the already-addicted texting generation.

I'm all for playing games. I think the video is cool but it's not a technology that has an actual purpose.

Who wants to plug their phone into some unknown piece of hardware?

Wouldn't a paper and crayon made up like the kindergarten worksheet that the table is styled after take a lot less time, and probably fewer net resources? And be just as much fun to fill out minus the cool for the sake of being cool factor.

Remember that IBM commercial -- no flaming logos? There's a huge difference between looking cool and being cool.

caseynfld -

Here's how to make a pizza for a BUCK.

-The crust -

#1 - I make a gluten-free pizza crust using 2-cups of cooked quinoa for a large pizza, and that's my most expensive pizza - using about 3-oz. of quinoa, or about 79-cents (often less when I can get quinoa at a discount or clearance) - plus one egg or an egg-substitute (chia seed or flaxseed goop) to hold the mixture together.

#2 - I'll make a "stacked pizza" using 2 corn tortillas (enough for the two of us - often making a Taco Pizza with them).

#3 - "Live Gfree" wrap (from Aldi) - 67-cents (enough for 6 small slices - which is one meal of 2-slices each, and hubby has the leftover for lunch the next day).

Before going gluten-free, I made pizza crusts from freshly-milled flour from whole wheat berries, or other grains, and sometimes the grain was free (really cost effective ;-). Making a naturally-leavened pizza crust by fermenting flour and homemade kefir only costs pennies. You can probably still get a package mix for making a pizza crust for under a $1 at the grocery store.

--Sauce - is made with 1 T. tomato powder (commercial or homemade from dehydrated tomato skins - which most people toss into the compost or trash), water, a little vinegar, pinch of salt, maybe a little sweetener, a dab of coconut oil, and dried Italian Spices (from my own garden).

--Toppings: Bits of leftover meat (from the freezer or from meals from earlier in the week) - often what other people toss into the trash. I don't purchase meat toppings just for a pizza - like pepperoni. I have a $10/week meat budget, so there's not a lot of "special" meats purchased. LOTS of vegetables (fresh and frozen from the garden, rehydrated from freeze-dried - it's a good way to clean out the refrigerator and use veggies that would otherwise go to waste). I purchase fresh mushrooms when they are reduced at the store.

-Cheese -I don't use a lot of cheese. One "Fit & Active" Light Mozzarella String Cheese stick (shredded on a fine grater) is more than enough for a large pizza, or 1/4 - 1/2 stick for a small pizza. I also make fresh homemade mozzarella cheese using powdered milk. Because I purchase powdered milk in bulk amounts (by-the-bucket) it's much cheaper than commercial liquid OR powdered milk, and generally less expensive to make mozzarella cheese at home - although I like to keep a package of mozzarella string cheese on hand. Because I use a lot of vegetable toppings (mostly from garden produce), we don't need/want a lot of cheese, and cheese and meat can be the expensive ingredients when used liberally.

--I use dehydrated bean flakes to make "instant" refried beans when I make a Taco Pizza - plus some seasonings. May or may NOT add some cooked ground beef or ground turkey. One-third cup of bean flakes is enough for our large pizza, 1-2 T. for a small pizza - so that will only cost pennies. I also make dehydrated beans from cooked beans, and that makes a quick refried bean mixture with a small amount of cooking. I can also mill beans into bean flour and use it for nearly-instant refried beans - cooks in about 8-minutes (you can find recipes by Rita Bingham on-line or in her books - "Country Beans" or "Natural Meals in Minutes"). I'll also make homemade Ranch Dressing (using homemade kefir and spices) and use it to make a "white" pizza, usually topping it with a little leftover cooked chicken or crumbled sausage (homemade, using turkey burger).

--BBQ sauce (bottled or homemade) also makes a nice sauce - and a little goes a long ways.

-Grainlady

Well now I am hungry for pizza. Put what I need on my grocery list & will have pizza next weekend.

Grainlady-you amaze me!! I have read your posts here & at the cooking forum.

But you had to buy those ingredients you used even left over items, they originally cost you money to buy so its not cheap as you say.

Hm.... I dunno, Kathleen. I use expensive ingredients. Just to see, I checked what my crust would cost at replacement value on Amazon and added a nickel for good measure. That puts me at $1.30 for a medium pizza crust. I did more of a ball park for the toppings since I don't have them weighed out and had to kind of guess by volume, but it's about $2.50 including the cheese, sauce and my favorite organic broccolini and onions with balsamic vinegar. I checked--Italian sausage costs about the same as the broccolini. That's $3.80 for a luxury pizza. No free wheat here! And I use malt and EVOO in the crust, which are surprisingly expensive. That doesn't count the electricity, of course, or of the kitchen and fancy pizza stone, but you get the picture. Given Grainlady's parameters and bulk buying, I believe her dollar.

It's hard costing out leftovers, especially when they're scraps rather that full portions, so it's normal in a budget to charge them at the time they're cooked rather than consumed, figuring that where the pizza might benefit from getting them "free", the original dishes would be over charged for the amount not eaten. This is also better practice because not every scrap gets used but all must be accounted for. If she used one of those sausages and got the price up to $2, do you think the point would be any different? I make better pizza than I can buy, which is unfortunate, because sometimes I don't want to do it and would spend ten times what it costs (minus power and overhead) if it were worth eating.

Wow, Grainlady, one mozzarella stick for an entire large pizza? I can see that on a quarter of a pizza...

But I do appreciate your garden usage, and the scrap meats usage.

I had to do some math and it looks like my pizzas cost about $2 a pie at home.

We have pizza night every Friday and I calculated the cost of the yeast, flour, tomato sauce, tomato paste, mozzarella, pepperoni, bell pepper and the onion.

I didn't include cost of cooking it or the spices I add to the pizza sauce but it is still, I would say, fairly accurate.

I don't have a garden to get veggies from so my cost is with everything being bought at the store. I do use more than one little cheese stick.

Last week I made 4 pizzas and a 9x13 pan of half bread/half cheese sticks and it took a pound of mozzarella.

I guess I should explain --- I'm a certified instructor and teach nutrition and cooking classes. I regularly teach a class on "$1 MEALS", so food cost analysis isn't something I take lightly. Although I may have to change the title to $2 meals in 2016 due to rising prices, as I've been reevaluating the actual costs of some of the recipes for an upcoming class.

The USDA is predicting a 3% increase in supermarket prices across the board in coming months. Eggs, chicken, and ground turkey, once a mainstay for $1 Meals, have taken a dramatic hit and are expected to increase by up to 30% over 2014 prices, according to the USDA.

I've kept a "Price Book" for foods I normally purchase since the early 1990's, so I can tell you how there are many foods I once purchased on a regular basis that are no longer purchased, or very rarely purchased, due to increased prices. I track when to expect stock-up prices on certain foods, and I will set aside money just for those purchases. I buy for stocking-up -- approximately 70-75% - and 25-30% for fresh foods), and I "shop" from our home food storage when planning meals. Anyone can do it if they are interested in cutting their food costs. I also donate 10% of our food to charities (local mission, food drives, Food Bank).

I happen to live where food prices are lower than the National average - 93 on the index, with 100 being the National Average. I can still find meat for $2/pound, and under, but it's not as readily available as it once was. I've become adept at feeding 2 adults a well-balanced diet on a $125/month food budget (of which $10/week is earmarked for meat), and I've done it on this amount since 2009.

That means I average $2.08 per day - per person - for all meals and snacks - and you'll not find us wanting for anything, and we enjoy a wide variety of foods in our diet. In my classes I regularly show people how budget $25 per person per week for groceries - we do it for just under $17 per person per week...

I do this by practicing home food storage (another class I teach), and buying food at rock bottom low prices (often in bulk - as plllog pointed out). So a $1 pizza is child's play - especially when you have a garden and you freeze or dehydrate your produce to use later. I have to prove it can be done for myself before I can teach these cost-saving measures to others - and I walk-the-walk, not just talk-the-talk.

When the average home wastes up to 40% of their food purchases, you'll find me consciously using, dehydrating, freezing, or preserving what most people toss into the trash. We also consume less food (total) than the average American (probably because we eat whole foods and don't have a lot of "junk" foods in the diet). Overeating is wasting food and wasted money.

-Grainlady

grainlady, do you factor in quality with food or just price? My food bills are outrageous considering it's just my husband and I at home, but I tend to buy really high quality food that comes with a high price tag. Like my pasture-raised eggs are $7 a dozen, recently bought 6 pasture-raised chicken breasts for $50 and organic produce is usually over $4 a pound. I only buy grass-fed dairy. I absolutely do see a difference in taste and nutrition between these items and the normal ones I used to buy.

How do you balance cost with quality nutrition? Do you consider things like factory vs. pastured/grass-fed animal sources? Organic or conventional? I'd love to stretch our budget a little more without sacrificing nutrition or taste.

Grainlady, I'm still not going to just put one mozz stick on a whole pizza (and remotely enjoy it), but otherwise you do have some great ideas. Though food prices at the extremities of the country will differ from Iowa.

Chi83: where do you see $7 pastured eggs/dozen? Are you living in an area hit by poultry diseases? Here in CT I am getting my farmers' market eggs at anywhere from $3.50 -$4.50 a dozen, depending which stand I see. And most are at the lower price end.

Artemis, I get them at Whole Foods. There are definitely cheaper brands available but the brand I get (Vital Farms) provides their chickens with more space than any other egg farm and it's important to me that the animal products I use are the most ethical that I can find.

I might check out some farmers markets and I think my CSA offers them sometimes.

I definitely see a difference in the eggs. The yolks are much darker and more vivid and they taste better.

1. Our "large" gluten-free pizza is about 10-inches (made with 2-cups of cooked quinoa for the crust). We use pizza as a delivery-system for fresh/frozen veggies and fresh/dried herbs from the garden, a little meat (optional). It's not a delivery system for an obscene glut of cheese - and I make a homemade pizza nearly every Sunday night and nobody has complained about a shortage of cheese.

2. There was a time when my budget allowed me to purchased top quality meat (grass-fed beef, natural bison, and free-range chicken) from friends/relatives who raise them and have them processed at local meat processing plants, or process the chickens themselves, but the prices are too extreme now. I'd rather eat less meat and rely more of plant-derived protein, and stick to our food budget. It doesn't take a genius to spend more on food! I teach food and nutrition classes at the Food Bank, SNAP, elderly at the Sr. Center, etc.; people who need to make the most from their food dollars and assistance resources. People who can't afford to be choosy. So if I don't live it everyday, it's hard to teach them how it's done.

Our meals don't revolve around meat, other than Monday night when I usually make meat the feature. But the feature meat gets used for many other meals, sandwich meat for lunches, some for the freezer, and often some kind of soup (when it includes bones or a carcass).

We have good quality local meat that is affordable (I live in a rural area), so that's what I generally purchase - especially since prices have gone off the charts. I always stick to my $10-week budget for meat. If I don't find anything that week, the next week I'll carry over the $10 and have $20 to spend - and so-on.

I also grind meat - especially when I can find turkey thighs or turkey breasts at a reasonable price - and I make my own turkey sausage and use ground turkey instead of high-priced ground beef. I also extend ground beef or ground turkey with a mixture of black rice or quinoa and lentils when using it in a casserole. Before going gluten-free I made "wheat meat" and used it ground as a high-protein meat extender. (FYI - You can only extend protein with a protein, and still get a serving of protein. If you extend it with carbohydrates from pasta and rice, you are only increasing your carbs, not protein.) We always have at least 2-servings of meat or meat alternative each day, and I follow the old "Basic 4" food program (and have since the 1970's) so we have plenty of food from all the food groups incorporated in our meals and snacks each day. I teach nutrition classes, so I also practice what I teach.

Eggs are also local and good quality - and I get fresh farm eggs from a friend as often as possible. Since the recent price increase, I purchase a dozen fresh shell eggs about once a month - and will until they go under $1/doz. I have been using a lot more egg substitutes (chia seeds and flax seeds), choosing eggless baked goods and recipes to adjust to the increase in egg prices. I am also using Ova-Easy Whole Egg Crystals, which I keep stocked in our home food storage. I have commonly switched to powdered eggs in the winter for many years, when the prices tend go up, and the cost per egg for powdered eggs is less than fresh shell eggs. It's also how I rotate the stock in the food storage room.

3. "Quality" of food is subjective.... And paying a high price for food doesn't make it "better quality". We consume primarily whole foods, so we leave the "junk" and highly-processed foods at the store. When we have potato chips, I make them from home-grown white, blue, and sweet potatoes in the microwave, not deep-fried. We also grow a lot of our own food - indoors AND out - all year. After the first hard frost I grow herbs indoors, as an excellent source for fresh food high in nutrition, make sprouts, micro-greens, and grow wheatgrass (and other grains) and juice it from late fall until we start getting fresh garden produce in the spring. I purchase very little so-called "fresh" produce (generally high-priced and containing very little nutrition) from the store in the winter - but grow plenty of our own indoors. Including hydroponic crops from our AeroGarden and a Window Farm (http://www.windowfarms.com/). My sister picks fresh citrus (free) where she lives and brings or ships it to us a few times in the winter.

-For 3 decades now - I mill flour, meal, and grits from whole grains, beans, and seeds, and I also make flakes using a Flaker Mill. I mill cornmeal from blue corn - which is higher in nutrition and protein than white and yellow corn. I flake my own oatmeal and make steel-cut oats from whole oat groats (which I purchase in bulk - all within my $125/month food budget). I have a large variety of grains, beans, and seeds in storage (last count was 27) - a large percentage are organic, but not all. I make my own oat milk, coconut milk, and almond milk (and other dairy-free "milk"). I buy fresh goat milk occasionally, but have used powdered milk and milk substitutes (low-lactose and lactose-free for lactose-intolerant family members) since 1981 - at a fraction of the cost compared to milk from the grocery store.

-And that doesn't even get into the FREE food available.... apples, pears, sorghum, wheat, berries, grapes, plums.....

-Grainlady

Yeah it's about priorities, I guess. I would rather spend a little more cash than spend all the time that you do making, growing and preserving food, though I do admire it. Your food budget is impressive. We easily spend your monthly budget in a week.

I definitely see a difference in quality and nutrition for the food I choose. The produce is much better than my local Vons and I firmly believe grass-fed dairy is better for all involved, though I am torn on whether I should be eating dairy at all.

I live in suburbia though so local farms are limited so I'm stuck with stores where I'm paying a premium. I'm sure if I look I can find some options but I'm okay spending a little more to save time. There will always be more money but we can't get time back!

Grain lady, very interesting. Do you grow your own beans? I like Jacob 's Cattle Beans and one year planted a few on the store bought dried beans. To my delight, I got quite a few beans from just those few seeds. My father used to live on a farm and one of their crops was JC beans.

I also had good luck with collecting and planting (what started out as) Roma or Italian wide beans. If the green bean stage got too mature, I let them continue to grow fat then shelled them. Buttery delicious for a vegetable or added to a homemade minestrone. I let some of the beans stay on the vine until they pod cracked and I had sort of vine-dried beans to plant the following season. Of course after so much collecting and replanting, the beans are not as wide, but still taste great in the various ways we consume them. I've been wondering about making "flours" from ground dried beans or legumes to use in crackers and such. I read that your gut gets better at digesting legumes if you eat them regularly -- resulting in much less flatulence. (For cooked dried beans, I soak overnight in lots of water, then drain. I parboil and rinse/drain any beans for new pot baking.

Back to pizza: do you have a good recipe for "soca/socca" -- that thin grilled bread made from chickpea flower?

i think what you're doing is great, BTW.

starsplitter -

I've grown and dried beans from the garden, but I have a friend who grows them on her organic farm so I buy in bulk from her. Saves a lot of precious space in my postage stamp size yard for other things, and I help her with harvest ;-).

I got disgusted with the high price for amaranth at the little health food store here in town, when it first was available. I did some research, planted some of the seeds I purchased from the health food store (nothing to lose there...), and got a bumper crop and enough amaranth seeds for 2-years the first time I grew it. Now I keep it to no more than 5 or 6 plants. Not to mention all the fresh greens you get from the leaves in the spring.

I would suggest some research on sprouting beans to aid in digestion if you are adding more of them to your diet. (http://www.insonnetskitchen.com/how-to-sprout-cook-beans/) By sprouting beans, they are essentially a predigested food. Beans I'm going to cook, I sprout until the tail is 1/4" long or less - not as long as those like mung beans or alfalfa sprouts.

Another good resource about using beans is "Country Beans" by Rita Bingham. She regularly adds bean flour to almost "anything". FYI - When you add bean flour to breads and baked goods, choose small white beans because they have the least amount of beany flavor, and keep it to 20% or less of the total replacement of flour. I do a lot of sprouting and dehydrating beans due to hard-to-digest phytic acid and complex sugars in them. I avoid fava beans entirely because the phytic acid and enzyme inhibitors is not neutralized by soaking, sprouting or fermenting, like it is in other beans.

Not familiar with "soca/socca", but it sounds like something I should look at. I generally use chana dal (immature chickpeas - I get them from Bob's Red Mill) for cooking and milling into flour, instead of chickpeas, because chana dal are one of the lowest foods on the glycemic index of foods.

I bet I've tried at least 10 different kinds of gluten-free pizza crusts (g-f mixes - too much rice flour and high-glycemic starches, cauliflower - have to avoid it and a long list of other foods, crushed pork rinds - too much sodium.....). I also thought I might make a recipe of Arepa dough and try it for a pizza, but it's probably easier to just use corn tortillas (which we like as a stacked pizza). We like Arepas for gluten-free sandwiches.

-Grainlady

The reason eating beans more regularly reduces the bean-flatulence is that the gas (in people who don't have bean issues or intestinal issues) is a reaction to much more fiber than non-bean eaters usually get, but when you eat a lot of fiber, there's no problem.

Grainlady is the authority on sprouting, and worth listening to.

In my own bean research, however, I've learned that soaking doesn't reduce the flatulence (though the legend going around is that it does), and that it also doesn't improve the cook unless your beans have been drying in open storage for years, and then it won't fully restore them. For your recent crop beans, or the dried ones from the store, the difference is negligible, and can adversely affect the texture. Instead, put the pot in the oven, or use a pressure cooker, and you can have perfect, tender beans in a short amount of time with no soaking. (I'm talking straight beans here--you obviously have to soak to get sprouts.)

I haven't made Socca in years, and don't remember all the changes that aren't on the page, but linked is the recipe I have saved. I first had them at a cousin's house and make them more like she does, with an appreciable amount of oil in the pan (way more than brushed on), and I use a crepe pan. There's also a lot more oil in the batter, the way she makes it, but no water. That's regular olive oil. EVOO would be overpowering if more were used. I think my cousin's are Italian in origin, and meant to be dense and rich, but thin and nearly crisp. Since they're thinned with oil rather than water, instead of little pancake bubbles, they kind of puff up like a tortilla on a comal. Also, because of that they're never drizzled with more oil. Okay, having worked all that out, the linked recipe isn't what I actually do. It's what I look at when I do something different. :) But I think it's a good recipe nonetheless, and worth trying. But, yes, eating it piping hot out of the pan is the way to go. :)