Shaved Asparagus Pizza

AJ and Andrew have never steered me wrong - so I decided to try this odd sounding recipe. It is amazing. The Parmesan and Mozerella cheese provided a good foundation for the peeled asparagus. I was worried, using my old conventional (and very dull) vegetable peeler, but each thick spear was cut into about 5 slices. They got a bit roasted in the cooking process, and the final flavor was amazing. Just make it and see for yourself!

I used smitten kitchen's pizza dough, when I make this again, I'll use something a bit less salty.

I made tonight this based on aj's recommendation below and I have to agree - this was excellent pizza. The asparagus and cheese went together perfectly, and the asparagus was perfect - not soggy, not raw, but just lightly cooked.

I used Peter Reinhart's Neo-Neapolitan dough for the crust and then followed the directions as written, though we didn't have scallions to put on top once it was out of the oven.

I found that our vegetable peeler worked fairly well on the asparagus, though I had to press pretty hard. I also found that our pizza didn't take the 10-15 minutes she recommends in the recipe - more like 7 or 8 in our oven set at 500 degrees.

Update: I've made this a few more times since first reviewing it, and it continues to impress. It's a great appetizer, and we served slices of it cold as part of several different types of nibbles for a summer party, to lots of acclaim.

This is pretty awesome as pizzas go. My husband referred to this as a "perfect recipe" and from an end-result point of view I have to agree.

I didn't find using the recommended vegetable peeler to shave the asparagus to be very effective. In fact, I found it frustrating and after two stalks, I switched to the smallest, sharpest paring knife I have, and found it much easier and quicker.

I also made the dough one day before, let it rise, and then punched down and refrigerated over night. It turned out really well -- a great thin crust.

The chopped scallions sprinkled on top after the pizza comes out of the oven are just the right punch up to the flavor.

I followed the recipe and used parmesan and buffalo mozzarella but this is a recipe that invites experimentation with other cheeses.

This is a nice light lunch but it might also be interesting, cut into small pieces, as an appetizer. Either way, a pinot grigio is a nice pairing.