Rosemary-Tomato Pinwheels

Pass a tray of these pretty appetizers with cocktails, or have a couple alongside a bowl of soup with lunch, or for a snack. The recipe doubles easily.

The original recipe called for canned refrigerated pizza dough for the crust. Although PETA's website lists Pillsbury's canned refrigerated pizza dough on their "I can't Believe It's Vegan!" website, the dough contains other things I shy away from - hydrogenated oils most notably - even though they meet vegan standards. So instead, I chose a frozen pizza dough available at Whole Foods, sold individually wrapped in plastic in 1-pound portions. If you do buy a frozen variety like this, make sure to thaw it in the fridge starting about 24 hours ahead of time. Also, since the dough I bought was 1 pound - slightly more than standard 13.8 ounce canned pizza dough - I trimmed off the excess 2 ounces. Another alternative is to make your own, using the Pizza Dough recipe on this blog, but that's a bit more time consuming!

First, however, combine 2 tablespoons olive oil with 1/2 teaspoon minced fresh rosemary, 1/8 tsp. salt and 1 small minced garlic clove; let stand for about an hour - mine stood for about 50 minutes because I got impatient.

Meanwhile, pour boiling water over 1/2 a cup of sun-dried tomato halves (buy the kind packed without oil). Let stand for 30 minutes, then drain and chop.

Lightly sprinkle a work surface with flour, and pat the pizza dough into a 15x10 inch rectangle - this takes a few minutes, because pizza dough tends to want to smoosh back in on itself, so be gentle. Brush with half of the olive oil mixture (about 1 tablespoon).

Sprinkle the top evenly with the chopped sun-dried tomatoes, 1/2 cup thinly sliced basil, 1/4 cup grated vegan cheese in place of Romano (such as the vegan mozzarella from Galaxy Foods), and 1 tablespoon chopped fresh rosemary.

Roll up jelly-roll fashion starting on the long, 15-inch edge. Cut the roll into 12 (1-inch) slices, and place on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. I wasn't sure whether to place them horizontally or vertically, but chose horizontally (that is, the way they are ultimately pictured in the photo at the top of this page) which seems to have been the proper choice. Lightly flatten each pinwheel with your hand - I put a little flour on my palm, as the dough was getting sticky! Brush the tops with the remaining olive oil mixture, then bake at 425 degrees for 12 minutes.

Each pinwheel is 130 calories.

Cost:
olive oil $10.99
rosemary $2.49
garlic $0.51
sun-dried tomato halves packed without oil $2.69
frozen pizza dough $1.69
vegan cheese $3.39