Quick Pepperoni Calzones

I love Taste of Home magazine because it tends to have more family-friendly, homestyle-type recipes.  I also enjoy Martha Stewart and Food Network magazines for their gorgeous pictures, but just don't try as many of the recipes.

For this week's dinners, I'm trying 3 new recipes from the latest issue of Taste of Home.  Last night Jack helped me make Quick Pepperoni Calzones.  It was a really easy recipe, and I especially loved two things about it.

First, I would call this a semi-homemade recipe.  You are just assembling ingredients and that means it is very quick to prepare!

Second, you could customize this for whatever tastes you have in your family.  For example, Grace does not care for pepperoni, so I just made hers with cheese.  Next time, I will add some veggies to mine instead of pepperoni.  You could also fill with Italian sausage, ham, bacon, veggies, or many other options.

Here are the ingredients.  I doubled the recipe so I could freeze a batch of these for a quick dinner when we are on the go.  These are like homemade Hot Pockets.

I had never used frozen bread dough, but it was really easy.  I took it out of the freezer around noon and covered it with saran wrap in the pan.  Around 5:00, it had risen and was ready to use.

You might notice that I used Turkey pepperoni for this recipe.  I tried regular pepporini a similar recipe a few months ago (Pepperoni Pinwheels) and it was like a lake of grease in the baking pan. The turkey pepporoni says 70% less fat and I believe it.  We didn't have an oil slick in our baking pan!

I used a knife to divide the loaf into four sections.  Then I rolled each one into a circle.  I would suggest rolling as thin as possible.  The ones that I didn't flatten as well were very puffy.  Next we filled each one and sealed them up.

And finally sprinkle with some parmesan cheese and Italian seasoning.

Final product...a quick and yummy dinner.

1 cup chopped pepporoni
1/2 cup pasta sauce
1/4 cup shredded mozzerella
1 loaf (1 lb) frozen bread dough (thawed)
1 or 2 T milk
1 T parmesan cheese
1/2 t Italian seasoning

Preheat oven to 350.  Mix pepperoni, sauce, and mozzarella.  On a lightly floured surface, divide dough into four portions.  Roll each into a 6" circle.  Top with pepperoni mixture.  Fold and seal.  Place on greased baking sheet.  Brush milk over tops.  Sprinkle with parmesan and seasoning.  Bake 20-25 minutes.


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