I used to never watch TV. Up until my husband came along, I had a small TV, but it’s sole purpose was to play movies in the background while I read or studied. It was a rare occasion that I’d actively pay attention to the screen. Then Scott came along, and since he’s not just a fan of TV but a professional special effects artist who worked on several TV shows, TV crept into our lives.
In my mind, there are a whole lot of wonderful things we can be doing other than staring at a screen, but at the same time, there’s a lot of great content out there now. I had plenty of time to stumble across new to me shows during my pregnancy, and I’m now revisiting those now that I’m learning my new rhythm with Baby Bean. I found shows that I had felt bad for missing out on but learned I was actually better off for having not seen, and some great ones that I wanted to watch more often.
I found The Pioneer Woman when I was flipping through channels once and paused. Normally, I’m a little snobby when it comes to Food Network – half of the shows I’ve seen will show you easy, tasty, and quality recipes and the other half will show you a recipe where you add a pound of butter to a gallon of beer and fry it in oil for a minute and before you can see what it’s supposed to be, you feel your arteries starting to burst and flip away from the channel. However, I’ve followed Ree’s blog for a long time, and found her show just as funny and welcoming as her articles, and stuck around. No artery bursting there, either – just good, easy food.
This particular show, she was in the middle of taking her viewers on a shopping trip, picking up a metric ton of mozzarella among other things. As she talked, she flashed to a recipe for a pesto mozzarella ciabatta sandwich that made me drool upon sight. I love pesto in all forms, but never thought of packing it as a sandwich. Add caprese touches, and I’m sold! And since I’m avoiding deli meat these days, it gave me a new meal I could take to work.
Here’s my take on this tasty and healthy sandwich.
Fresh Caprese Sandwich
Serves 4.
What You’ll Need:
- 1/2 cup prepared pesto
- 4 ciabatta sandwich rolls or 8 small ciabatta rolls sliced in half
- 2 tbsp butter
- 4 oz fresh spinach
- fresh basil leaves
- 8 oz fresh mozzarella, thickly sliced {8 slices}
- 1-2 beefsteak tomatoes, thickly sliced {8 slices}
How to Make Them:
1. Slice the rolls in half if they aren’t already sliced. Drop the butter onto a griddle or flat bottomed skillet over medium heat and let it melt. When it’s melted, turn the bread cut side down into the skillet and toast until the bread is lightly browned.
2. Spread pesto on each half of the roll. Layer with basil leaves, tomato slices, fresh mozzarella, and fresh spinach leaves. Close the roll carefully.
3. Serve as is, or press in a panini press for a little melted cheese action {guess which one we like?}.
Wrapping these babies isn’t necessary, but I felt lazy just sharing a sandwich recipe with you, so I felt like I had to dress them up a little!
Are you pro or against TV time? What TV shows make your line-up?
