Do It Yourself "Thin" Bread and Turkey Apple Cranberry Sandwich

When we started paying closer attention to how we "spent" our calories my husband and I found that we ate significantly less bread than we were used to.  In many cases I skipped bread because it would have used up all the food budget for my meal before I even put anything on it.  Additionally by skipping bread I also passed on most of the condiments I would have put on the bread. When we grilled brats or burgers at home I would skip the bun in favor of some multigrain chips or a whole grain side dish.  Similarly our sandwiches turned into low fat / low carb wraps. I usually don't mind giving up bread in favor of using my calories for other food but sometimes, gosh darn, I just want a sandwich.  

About two years ago major bread manufacturers released their "thin" sandwich breads and bagels.  I was skeptical but after trying Thomas' 100 Everything Bagel Thins I fell back in love with bread.  The thin products are a great way to have a sandwich or toast and use most of your calories on the filling.  The small down side to the "thin" products is their limited flavor options.

Around the same time the "thin" bread became widely available, we started to see some bread on our local grocery store shelves with a really catchy package.  Dave's Killer Bread, out of Milwaukie, Oregon, is a delicious product with a fantastic story.  Their vision, according to their website is, "to make the world a better place, one loaf of bread at a time." My husband and I began choosing Killer Bread over sandwich thins for all the reasons I just mentioned.  Problem is we would have to choose a half a sandwich to keep the calories reduced.  They do make a light bread but we really like the full on seed covered version.  So we resumed our life with sandwiches few and far between.

Then one day we got a tip from fellow Weight Watchers bread enthusiasts.  Their tip made me laugh when I heard it because it was so obvious but hadn't ever occurred to me.  Cut the bread in half.  Not to make two small pieces but more like filleting a fish.  The bread should be toasted at least a little and it is important to use a good knife but with a little bit of practice it is not difficult to make any bread "thin."

Last Saturday using homemade Killer Bread "thins" I made some really awesome turkey cranberry sandwiches.  

I began by throwing together a batch of low sugar cranberry sauce.  I went heavy on the orange zest and light on the sugar so it would be really tangy.

While the sauce cooked down, I tossed together a mix of white and dark turkey meat, half an apple, thinly sliced green onion, about 6 large basil leaves, a generous shake of dried dill, and some dry mustard.  I mixed in about 1/3 of a cup of plain non-fat yogurt to make it creamy but not heavy.


I built the sandwiches with the toasted side out and heaped the turkey and apple mixture onto a bed of mixed greens with the cooled cranberry sauce on the opposite side.  The filling was a little bulky for the thin slices of bread but they still did a decent job of holding together.


Served with a few pretzels and the remaining apple I don't think this sandwich will be featured in Gourmet Magazine but for a Saturday afternoon it was just the ticket!

*Major Update! - I was just checking out Dave's Killer Bread's website and saw new light versions of both Good Seed (75 calories a slice) and 21 Grain (65 calories a slice)!!!  The original versions are 130 and 110 calories, respectively.  It is still a little lighter to make them thin but I am very excited about these new versions of their original flavors.  I now *heart* Dave's even more!

Leftover Thanksgiving Dinner Pizza!

Last night I embarked upon what may have been my greatest culinary experiment to date.  I don't want to over sell this, but, I believe what I did with leftover turkey would have made even the most proper puritan dance with glee!

Last weekend my husband and I popped into an ATM vestibule and while we waited in line we chatted about the menu for our Thanksgiving weekend board game party.  As we bounced around a few ideas I started playing with the thought of making a Thanksgiving pizza.  It didn't take long for the other people in the small room to jump in and share some of their own ideas for what might be part of such a creation.  

I was already thinking of things like turkey (obviously), fruit, nuts, celery, a strong cheese, and herbs.  The first suggestion was to use a white sauce or something suggestive of gravy.  I liked it but wasn't sold.  The next suggestion was to include grapes.  I liked the idea of roasted grapes providing a little sweet and tart flavor.  The last idea thrown out was cranberry pesto.  BINGO!  Pesto sounded like the perfect way to bring together the flavors I already had in mind.

Last night, I made a double batch of a basic pizza crust recipe using half wheat, and a quarter each of bread and all purpose flour. The crusts may qualify these pizzas to be dubbed trendy flatbreads rather than average pizzas.  I used sheet pans resulting in an oblong free form shape rather than the recognizable circle.  Maybe that made them rustic... Anywho.  I par-baked the crusts for 10 minutes one at a time before laying on all the toppings.

The toppings were a bit more involved than my usual pizza but trust me totally worth the effort.  I started with a tiny brush of olive oil over the entire crust and then layered on the following:

Cranberry Pesto -  After running all the raw cranberries through the food processor, the color was very much like that famous pink stomach remedy but it tasted great! I made it in the morning to give the flavors plenty of time to mingle and get all pesto-y by dinner time.

Leftover Turkey -  I used all white meat for turkey that I cubed small and tossed with some slices of garlic that roasted with the bird and a couple shakes of dry poultry seasoning.  

Caramelized Aromatic Veggies - While the crusts were par-baking I cooked some thin sliced yellow onion and celery heart until they were all soft and caramelized.

Gorgonzola Cheese - I cheated and picked up a small tub of crumbled cheese and then split the entire container between the two pizzas.  I felt like a rebel to my own cause carelessly tossing cheese around (Is that sad? Wait don't tell me).  I also sprinkled a little shredded cheddar over the top out of habit but it was completely unnecessary.

Fried Onions - Oh yes, I went there and it was soooo worth it!  I had most of a tub leftover after slimming down my green bean casserole.  A little crunchy topping sounded like just the ticket to take all the flavors right back to the Thanksgiving table.  I crunched them up in my hand and dusted them over the pies right before finishing them in the oven for an additional 15 minutes each.

When the pizzas came out of the oven the crust had a nice crunch on the edges with a chewy center, the cranberries turned a beautiful merlot color, the gorgonzola was soft and pungent, the fried onions were toasted, and the entire pizza smelled like a meal fit for the Jamestown Colonists.  I almost teared up with joy.  I didn't, of course, because that might have made my in-laws uncomfortable.  In addition to the pizza I made a nice vegetarian chili both for the vegetarians and in case the whole pizza project was a disaster.  Together with a colorful salad, (brought by my in-laws) our meal was ready to go.

Plates were filled and eating began, would they try it, like it, take one bite and leave the rest on their plates?!?  I held my breath.  They liked it!  My mother in-law confirmed, the pizza did actually taste like a Thanksgiving dinner and it was good!  Oh happy day!  

The whole wheat flour in the crust and the caramelized veggies tasted just like stuffing and the other flavors and textures worked fantastically.  The best part about this experiment is, we now have leftover leftovers, something I am completely okay with!

Cranberry Pesto:

Adapted from a posting on www.food.com by Recipe Junkie who took it from, "So Easy So Delicious" by Ellie Deaner

1 1/2 cup cranberries
12 large basil leaves
5 sage leaves
2 tablespoons fresh squeezed lemon juice
1 tablespoon sugar
3-4 tablespoons of olive oil
1/2 cup walnuts

Combine most of the ingredients in a large food processor bowl -reserve a tablespoon of the oil and a little of all the others. Pulse machine until the pesto is coarsely ground.  Add the remaining ingredients slowly, to taste, pulse to combine.  The finished pesto will be a course paste. Place in a sealed container and refrigerate for at least four hours to allow the flavors to develop.  Use the pesto as a dip for veggies or crackers or with pasta or pizza.

Click Here for the original recipe.