Jeff challenged me (once again) to make one pizza with leftovers instead of one of the next recipes in the book. I chose to make the Bloody Mary Pizza that was scheduled and accept his challenge for the other pizza. Originally, I thought I would do something with a half empty jar of sauerkraut that we had in the fridge. It was some fabulous kraut that one of my co-workers had purchased for me in Forest Lake. However, I felt that if I were to use the kraut, I would need some sort of meat to accompany it on the pizza. Alas, we had actually done a very good job of clearing out all the left-over meat earlier in the week.
So, the search continued. Let's see... cranberry goat cheese log, jalapeno artichoke dip, sweetened condensed milk, pickles of all types, olives of all types, pickled peppers, quinoa, and more cheeses. I zeroed in on the Cranberry log. While it was delicious, we had been eating on it for a while. We, of course, had gotten it at Costco, so it was a much larger quantity than two people could eat in a reasonable amount of time. We had even served it a couple of times to guests, but it never seemed to end. It was decided. The log would be my starting point.
Now, the log had a little bit of sweetness because of the cranberries, and it had a little bit of cinnamon mixed into the cranberry coating. However, the log was so big, that the goat cheese to cranberry/cinnamon ratio was very high. I was convinced it would just be an underlying accent on my pizza, but it needed another acid - something tangy and perhaps spicy. I pulled out an almost empty jar of hot banana peppers. Yeah, I could finish these off on the pizza. I found a red onion, a half-used jar of pesto, and an open container of mozzarella pearls. The dough recipe from the Bloody Mary Pizza made two crusts, so I had all my pieces of the puzzle.
Dough:
1 cup cold water
2 teaspoons salt
2 tablespoons sugar
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 teaspoons active dry yeast
3¼ cup bread flour
Toppings:
3 tablespoons prepared pesto
1½ ounces sliced red onion
2 ounces pickled hot banana peppers, sliced
4½ ounces cranberry goat cheese
3 ounces fresh mozzarella pearls
Dough: Whisk together the cold water, salt, sugar, and olive oil in the bowl of a large stand mixer. Add the yeast and whisk again. Dump the flour in and mix with the dough hook attachment at medium speed until the dough comes together and starts to cling to the hook. Remove the dough from the bowl, divide in half, and knead each half for about three minutes or until the dough becomes smooth. Form each half into a ball. Cover with a damp towel and let rest for two hours. Only one ball is needed for the pizza. At this point, you can wrap one in plastic wrap and store in the freezer for another use. Place the other ball on a small baking sheet. Wrap plastic wrap over the ball and baking sheet and store in the refrigerator for 24 hours.
Assemble the pizza: Take the dough out of the fridge and let it come to room temperature (remove at least a half an hour before you work with it). Preheat the oven to 500º F with a pizza stone inside, if using. Roll or stretch the dough out to a 14 inch circle on a cornmeal dusted pizza peel or board. Spread the pesto over the stretched dough. Separate the rings of the onions and scatter over the pesto. Distribute the banana peppers over the onions. Break up the goat cheese into pea-sized pieces, making sure that the cranberries get evenly distributed throughout the crumbles. Sprinkle the crumbles over the peppers. Evenly place the mozzarella pearls over the pizza. Slide onto pizza stone and bake for about 10 minutes, or until the goat cheese starts to brown slightly, and the pearls have melted. Slice and serve.
I had decided that the pesto was going to be my "sauce", so I slathered on a generous layer of it over my stretched dough. The thinly sliced red onion rings were next, and I scattered those over the pesto.
The banana peppers I had found looked like a cross between regular banana peppers and jalapenos. They were pickled and whole. I tried to slice them into pretty rings to compliment my onion ring slices, but because of the softness of the peppers, they mostly ended up in strips. While not as pretty as I had hoped, I was sure that they would taste the same as if they were sliced.
The cranberry goat cheese log was still a pretty formidable chunk. The cranberry portion of it was just around the outside edges. I wanted an even distribution of the cranberries throughout the cheese, so I took a fork to the log and pulverized it into pebble sized pieces. I stirred the pebbles around a little bit to mix in the cranberries.
The mozzarella pearls I had found were left over from last week's pizza adventure. They were still very soft and fresh and delicious. I figured they would be a nice addition to the rest of the ingredients - not an overpowering flavor, but a great binder. Goat cheese doesn't really melt well, so this was a nice transition cheese.
The pizza came out of the oven, and it was beautiful. The pearls had melted into little pools and anchored the rest of the ingredients to the dough. First bite brought the warm, garlicky flavor of the pesto, contrasted by the tang of goat cheese and the zip of the peppers. Once that bite was swallowed, there was a hint of the sweetness of the cranberries and the cinnamon. It was wonderful.
Adapted from Revolutionary Pizza by Dimitri Syrnkin-Nikolau
1 cup cold water
2 teaspoons salt
2 tablespoons sugar
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 teaspoons active dry yeast
3¼ cup bread flour
Sauce:
11½ ounces tomato juice
2¼ ounces tomato paste
½ ounce worcestershire sauce
¼ ounce habanero sauce
1 teaspoon celery salt
½ teaspoon freshly ground pepper
Toppings:
3 ounces sliced pepperoni
1½ ounces small green olives with pimentos, halved
1½ ounces celery, chopped finely
4 ounces shredded mozzarella cheese
Dough: Whisk together the cold water, salt, sugar, and olive oil in the bowl of a large stand mixer. Add the yeast and whisk again. Dump the flour in and mix with the dough hook attachment at medium speed until the dough comes together and starts to cling to the hook. Remove the dough from the bowl, divide in half, and knead each half for about three minutes or until the dough becomes smooth. Form each half into a ball. Cover with a damp towel and let rest for two hours. Only one ball is needed for the pizza. At this point, you can wrap one in plastic wrap and store in the freezer for another use. Place the other ball on a small baking sheet. Wrap plastic wrap over the ball and baking sheet and store in the refrigerator for 24 hours.
Make the sauce: Put the tomato juice, tomato paste, Worcestershire sauce, hot sauce, salt, and pepper into a blender and puree until smooth. Pour half of the mixture into a glass filled with ice and add some vodka. Drink.
Assemble the pizza: Take the dough out of the fridge and let it come to room temperature (remove at least a half an hour before you work with it). Preheat the oven to 500º F with a pizza stone inside, if using. Roll or stretch the dough out to a 14 inch circle on a cornmeal dusted pizza peel or board. Spread half of the sauce mixture over the dough. Arrange the pepperoni slices over the sauce. Scatter the celery and green olives over the pepperoni. Cover with the mozzarella. Slide pizza onto preheated stone and bake for 10-15 minutes or until the cheese starts to brown. Slice and serve.
Jennifer had arrived as I was finishing the assembly on the Goat Cheese Pizza, and I set her to the task of assembling the Bloody Mary Pizza. I had already stretched out the dough, and I handed her the sauce I had made Wednesday night, the chopped celery, the pepperoni, the olives that I had already halved, and the mozzarella. She was so quick at the assembly that I hardly had time to snap any pictures of the process!
While she worked on that, I started mixing our drink of the day. I had found this recipe surfing the internet while bored at work. Any recipe that makes use of that lonely bottle of chartreuse in the back of my liquor cabinet was going to be a hit with me.
1 measure gin
1 measure maraschino liqueur
1 measure green chartreuse
1 measure fresh lime juice
Add all ingredients to an ice-filled shaker. Shake. Strain into a chilled cocktail glass. Drink.
If I hadn't known what was in the drink, I would not have been able to identify its components - except the lime. It was slightly sweet and a little boozy with a hint of black licorice and a wash of citrus on the finish. It was tasty and dangerous. While it had a little zing, it wasn't overly strong-tasting. A couple of sips in, and we started to feel a little giddy.
The Bloody Mary Pizza came out of the oven, and it was lovely. The cheese had browned a little in spots, and the tiny olives were poking through the curtain of mozzarella. At first sight, it looked like a regular pepperoni olive pizza, but the taste was far from it. The sauce had a nice zip to it from the habanero and an underlying earthiness from the Worcestershire. The celery salt gave it a nice zing, and the chopped celery enhanced that and gave it a little crunch. The cheese held everything together and was a nice, smooth contrast to the brininess of the olives. I would definitely make this again!
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