Pizza Fridays ( Korean Shredded Beef Pizza)

So I don't know about all of you-- but in my house growing up, Friday was always pizza night. We usually just ordered from the local pizza place-- and hey who could blame my mom? Cooking all week for a family of six must have been exhausting. So it's no wonder why pizza is one of my favorite foods of all time. Now that I no longer live with my parents and do not partake in their weekly pizza fiesta, James and I have created a Friday pizza night of our own. Really this all started over the summer when we started grilling every variation of pizza you could ever imagine multiple times a week. Now that it is winter time and sub zero temperatures here in lovely New York we have continued our pizza tradition inside where I am not in danger of getting frost bite. We have also limited it to Friday nights because lets face it-- pizza is not the most health conscious food-- especially the way we like it. And if you are wondering how we like it-- cheesy. It is alll about the cheese.  This is one of my favorite pizza combos we have made yet--- and it all started off with left over Korean shredded beef. Now anyone who knows me knows that tacos are a very close second in the favorite food department, and I usually make some variation of them at least once a week. Anything for a margarita right? While blog surfing ( I do a ridiculous amount of this) I came across a recipe for Crock Pot Korean Beef Tacos with Cucumber Slaw --yum. I had been looking for some new recipes to throw in the Crock Pot--because let's face it-- what is better than coming home from work to a meal that you can enjoy with minimal effort? Just about nothing in my opinion. So this recipe was perfect because not only did I get to use the Crock Pot, but I also got my weekly taco fix. Two Birds. One Stone. I love it. The marinade on this is absolutely amazing. I would use it for just about any type of meat. And the cucumber slaw is light and refreshing with a little bite from the crushed red pepper. I loved it. Well besides the part where I grabbed corn tortillas instead of flour. That I would change next time--but for the most part-- huge success. One of the best parts about this recipe is that we had tons of left overs. And this time I knew exactly what the star of our Friday night pizza was going to be.

 The one thing that I was back and forth on, was what type of sauce/ cheese I wanted to use to tie this all together. It's times like these that I like to bounce ideas off of James and see what he thinks. After all he is going to be eating the pizza too-- and it doesn't hurt that he has this way of thinking of something that I would have never thought of. I had originally suggested going with a mild white cheddar, or monterey jack -- but James thought that either of those might be too strong and take away from the flavors of the beef. We ended up going with shredded fresh mozzarella. I had it on hand-- and it worked perfectly. James also suggested to dress it with bbq sauce. I had brown sugar bbq in the pantry and since brown sugar is an ingredient in the beef it worked really well. I ended up using the left over juices from the beef and mixing it with the bbq in a sauce pan over low heat until it thickened up a little. End result- yum! We also went with some red onions and added some scallions after it was out of the oven for added crunch. It was absolutely delish-- and I got to use up left overs with I am a huge fan of.

I think the other thing that made this pizza so yummy is that I finally have mastered the dough. I used to just pick up the pre-made dough from the refrigerated section at the grocery store. And that always worked fine too--and saved a lot of time. Maybe I am a glutton for punishment--or maybe it's that homemade dough is just so stinkin good. Either way I have started making homemade dough every other week for our pizza nights. And I don't plan on stopping any time soon! Notice I said every/other. Pizza dough stays well in the freezer, so I just double my go to recipe and freeze half of it for next week. What could be easier than that?

Find the recipe for the Korean Shredded Beef - here.
Check out my go-to pizza dough recipe- here.