Week 13: Sweet and Spicy Sage Pizza + Citrus Sage Honey Cake

Cooking with Jane, Recipes,

I knew I wanted to use sage in my recipe this week, and so I put a poll up on Facebook – pizza or cake? Pizza was the clear winner, but there were lots of people who were curious about the cake too. So I decided to do both (it was cruel to make you choose)! I present to you two very different recipes centred around the same delicious ingredient – sage 🙂

More Magnificent Meal Musings:

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Sweet and Spicy Sage Pizza

I dreamt up this pizza in the hopes of creating really satisfying flavour combinations that didn't hide the intensely aromatic quality of sage, but celebrated it. And I think I've found it! The drizzle of honey at the end is optional, but highly recommended.

Ingredients

  • 1 ball prepared pizza dough
  • 1/8 cup olive oil
  • 10 leaves fresh sage
  • 2 small zucchini or summer squash, very thinly sliced
  • 1 cup sliced cremini mushrooms
  • 1/2 cup crumbled goat cheese
  • pinches red chili flakes
  • liquid honey for drizzling
  • salt

Instructions

  1. Preheat the oven to 400.

  2. Begin by making the infused olive oil. Place olive oil in a small pot over low heat, and add in 6 leaves of finely chopped sage. Allow this to infuse while you are preparing the rest of the pizza ingredients. *This step is optional (you can just use plain olive oil), but does enhance the sage flavour!*

  3. Salt the slices of zucchini to bring out the moisture. Allow to sit for several minutes. Meanwhile, saute the mushrooms until browned and cooked down. Pat the zucchini dry with a clean tea towel.

  4. Stretch out the pizza dough onto preferred pan(s) – we use two circular pans, as the dough we use makes two thin crust pizzas.

  5. Remove the warming olive oil from the heat. Using a brush, cover the crust in the olive oil (if you don't have a brush, just drizzle it and then spread the oil around with a spatula or back of a spoon. Little pools of oil are okay). You may have some leftover oil – great! You can use it in marinades or salad dressings.

  6. Now it's time to build! First place the zucchini slices on the dough. Then add the mushrooms and goat cheese. Bake for 13-16 minutes.

  7. Once removed from the oven, sprinkle with chili flakes and drizzle with liquid honey. Garnish with remaining sage leaves by snipping them into small ribbons with a pair of scissors.

  8. Slice and serve!

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Citrus and Sage Honey Cake

I found this recipe on the blog Food52, and then adapted it to better suit what I wanted the flavours to be. You can find the original recipe here. This cake is dense and sweet, bright and aromatic. It was perfect with a cup of tea (and makes for a very yummy breakfast).

Ingredients

  • 3 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
  • 1 tablespoon baking powder
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 1/2 cup brown sugar
  • 1 cup vegetable oil
  • 1 cup honey
  • 1/2 cups granulated sugar
  • 1/2 cup brown sugar
  • 3 eggs
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla
  • 1 cup sage tea (1 cup boiled water with several leaves of sage) cooled
  • 1/2 cup orange juice
  • 1/4 cup whisky

Lemon+Sage Glaze

  • 3/4 cup granulated sugar
  • 2-4 tablespoons fresh sage chopped pretty fine
  • 1/4 cup lemon juice
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla

Instructions

  1. Grease well and flour a 10-cup bundt pan. Preheat your oven to 350F.
  2. In a large bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Whisk to combine. In a separate bowl, combine the oil, honey, sugars, eggs, vanilla, sage tea, orange juice, and whisky. Add the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and whisk to combine.
  3. Pour the batter into your prepared pan and bake for about 55 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean. Let the cake cool for about 5 minutes, then turn out onto a plate or baking rack. Prepare the glaze at this point.

Lemon+Sage Glaze

  1. Chop the fresh sage into thin, small pieces. Add it to the granulated sugar. Pour in the lemon juice and vanilla and stir to combine.
  2. Brush the glaze onto the hot cake. It will seem like a lot of glaze, but you should use it all! Also, it is imperative that you brush on the glaze while the cake is still hot. Let the cake cool completely before serving. To get a nice crust on the cake, refrigerate for two hours before serving.