Chicken And Fennel Flatbread Pizza

Fennel in one of my favorite vegetables.  The flavor of fennel is quite similar to anise, but they are not the same vegetable.  It is delicious raw, sliced in a salad.  It is completely different in flavor when cooked in a casserole, like this potato and fennel gratin which is quite tasty.  It is incredible roasted with other vegetables when the edges get a bit crunchy and caramelized and the flavors mellow.  Fennel leaves look like dill in their delicate, thin, wispy green appearance.  These leaves are used as an herb.  The fennel bulb is used as a vegetable.  Fennel is one of the main ingredients in original absinthe.  I love fennel.

The use of fennel in this recipe is what caught my eye on the Eating Well website.  Yes.  I am posting yet another recipe from the site.  Everything I’ve made so far has been wonderful, so I’ll keep trying things until I hit a bump.  Then I’ll back off, but not until I find something that doesn’t make me want seconds.

These pizzas are not greasy or overly cheesy.  The vegetables add great flavor, and the chicken is much better for you than pepperoni or sausage.  There isn’t any sauce on the pitas, which I thought would make them a bit dry, but they were not even close.  The little bit of cheese goes a long way and you don’t miss the sauce.

I changed the recipe just a bit.  I added salt, pepper and minced garlic to the chicken before cooking it, and I cooked the vegetables and chicken separately.  On two of the pizzas I used feta cheese instead of provolone and sprinkled some red pepper flakes on the finished products.  A combination of provolone and feta would be better since feta doesn’t melt very well.

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