Pizza for breakfast

I always find it interesting how our cultures influence the way we feel about different foods. For most of us from India, brought up on traditional food habits, the idea of eating something sweet for breakfast is quite odd. For Westerners, it is a source of amazement that our spice-eating starts from the first meal of the day. Our breakfasts are uppittu, poha, dosa with chutney and huli, parathas...theirs are pancakes and waffles, muffins and corn flakes...

One of the reasons that Indians have taken so well to Pizza is that in many ways it's not that different from what they eat. It's like having a naan with veggies on top. I remember, Nirula's had created this keema pizza which used to be tremendously popular. And now of course, Pizza Hut and others have gone whole hog with tandoori pizzas, pizza with paneer and so on. I'm waiting to see if chicken chettinad finds its way atop a pizza someday soon.

Naturally, pizza is one of my picky son's favourite things to eat. I think it's a reasonably healthy thing, especially if we make it out of whole wheat flour and add lavish toppings of veggies, so ordering pizza in is one of the treats he gets once in two weeks or so. It's also a really fun breakfast food, and one of the few things he gulps down without me standing over his head yelling my head off every half a second ( he is apt to forget eating and drinking when he is engrossed in his latest fad - paper aeroplanes - which he is engaged in every second of the day).

Pizza Toast

Ingredients:

Whole wheat bread/ Multigrain bread

Finely diced tomatoes

Finely diced green peppers

Finely diced red and yellow peppers

Finely diced onions

Pizza sauce ( To keep it simple, I use Fun foods pizza topping, but at a pinch even ketchup will do)

Grated mozzarella cheese ( or Amul processed cheese - the kind out of a tin. Maybe it's habit, but I love the taste of it on these pizzas)

Assemble the pizza quickly by topping the bread slices with the pizza sauce and then the veggies and finally cheese.

Park in the oven for 2-3 minutes, until the toast turns crisp and brown.

Eat fast!