Raspberry Tea Pizzas; Ham and Cheese Calzones; Fruit Salad; Impromtu Pizza; Key Lime Half Pudding Cake; Plank Walker



     I thought it was my lucky day: One of the scheduled pizzas was a raspberry tea cake, and raspberries were on sale at Cub.  Only one problem:  They were out of them when I went, but I got a killer deal on chicken (99¢/lb).  I usually limit myself to one grocery trip a week, but I went again on Wednesday to check for raspberries, and get another load of boneless, skinless chicken breasts before Cub realized they were mismarked.  Apparently, Jeff had the same idea, because he came home with 6 more packages.        I had just cleared some working space on the counters, and he came home with more chicken and decided to vacuum-pack them in two-breast packages for the freezer.  After elbowing each other for a bit (I can't wait for a new kitchen!), we each claimed our space and got our rhythm going.



     I read the recipe list, and checked the freezer for any pre-made sweet crusts.  I didn't find any, and since this was the last recipe in the book that would use a sweet crust, I didn't want to make another batch.  We haven't been overly fond of the crust anyway.  I thought about making a pie crust, but I had tried that for an earlier pizza and failed after three attempts, so I was a little gun shy.  I was thinking about making some kind of cookie dough, but I wasn't sure how that would go.  I thought about the title of the recipe, and it says it is a raspberry tea pizza, which made me think of tea cakes.  I pulled out my trusty Pillsbury cookbook, which is my back-up for any recipe...  It has the basics, and several variations of everything.  I looked in the index, and Lo! and Behold!  There was a recipe for Swedish Tea Cakes!  What could go better with almond paste, raspberries and chocolate than a little cake made of almonds and butter and vanilla?  It was perfect.



      Unfortunately, I didn't have enough almonds to make both the almond paste and the tea cakes with 100% almonds (even though I was planning on cutting the recipe in half); so for the cakes, I used 3/4 cup of almonds and 1/4 cup hazelnuts.  The dough came together a bit crumbly.  I pressed it together, like you would a pie crust, if you are talented enough to be able to make one (don't try to make a pie crust in the Vitamix - you get glue...).  I was going to plop them onto the cookie sheet and flatten them out into little 2½" disks, but then I started thinking about the toppings...  Almond paste, raspberries, and chocolate.  What would keep those fillings from rolling off the disks before I got the tray into the oven.  I decided a muffin tin might be the solution!  I lined them with cupcake liners (I knew I would need those eventually!  I am so glad I bought them 15 years ago) then pressed the balls of dough into them and up the sides to form a sort of cup.



    Next order of business was to make the almond paste.  I do not have powdered sugar, so I ground up regular sugar in my coffee grinder until it was about the same texture and used that.  I threw the almonds and the sugar into the Vitamix and let it go.  I added the simple syrup with the almond extract while the motor was running, and it all folded in on itself until it flowed into an almond whirlpool.  I think it became more of a liquid or sauce than a paste.  Also, my sugar trick didn't work as well as I felt it should have - it was a little gritty yet. 

     I then assembled the desserts.  I was thinking I would cook them that night, so as to have less to do tomorrow, but I was worried about what would happen to the raspberries if cooked, then left to sit for 24 hours.  So, I decided to assemble and refrigerate.



I made some with blueberries, because Jeff has an adverse reaction to certain fruits with small seeds, and I didn't want him to feel left out.  I also made some free form pizzettes, just to see how it would have worked.

I then tin-foiled them all and put them in the refrigerator for the next day.

     What should I do next to make my day easier tomorrow?  I started thinking about my guests:  Pam was coming with her friend Sarah.  Jennifer and Roger and kids were coming, but I didn't really know when or who all was going to eat, and my former roommate Patrick and his girlfriend Karen were going to be joining us as well.  Since I hadn't asked anyone to bring anything I was thinking that I would have to make an impromptu pizza.  I dug through the freezer and found an herb crust dough.  I pulled that out along with a basic crust for the Ham and Cheese Calzones.  It was late, so I decided that was enough for one day.  Time for dinner, a drink, and a little wind-down time in front of the t.v.

    Oh, but wait!  I need to take the ham out of the freezer for the Ham and Cheese Calzones, so I can cut it up tomorrow.  I looked in the freezer in the kitchen.  There isn't any ham in there.  I looked in the freezer downstairs to no avail.  I ventured outside to the freezer in the garage and was unsuccessful there as well.  I debated using the left over pork roast from Pam's Pig Roast Party, but my darling husband volunteered to go the grocery store for me the next day and assured me that he would be able to get it to me before I needed to start right after work.

     My Thursday work day was so hectic, I didn't have time to breathe.  I listened to my cell phone voicemail on my way to my car after work, and heard my beloved's voice, informing me that he couldn't get away from the store to buy the ham.  Now what?  The next message was from Pam:  She was at the grocery store, and did I need her to get anything for me?  My savior!  I checked the time stamp on the message: it was 4:05 and here it was 5:20.  Was it possible that she was still there, or hadn't gone quite yet??  I called her up, and asked.  YES!  She was still in the parking lot, and being the wonderful, giving sister that she is, she said she would go back in and get me ham.





What Pammy looks like after I've had a cocktail.



     She showed up shortly after I got home, and started in on her salad.  It was called a fruit salad, but we both agreed that it was more like a salad with fruit in it.  She said she has been saving all kinds of recipes that she has cut out of magazines and newspapers (haven't we all?), and keeps thinking that she is going to get around to them someday.  She decided that today was a good start.   This was quite delicious!  Just the right amount of tang and sweetness.  We debated about how much lettuce to use, because the recipe calls for one head of Romaine, and Pammy had Romaine Hearts.  We decided on two.  On retrospect, we should have used all three that came in the bag.  But, it will be nice for me to have free lettuce for the week to go with my soon-coming bounty from the garden!                                                                    



  I decided to start on rolling out my dough for the calzones.  What I had thawed was a very small amount of dough.  I was wondering how I might stretch it out, so that each person could have at least one of the finished product.  It was painful.  I divided the dough into 12 pieces.  Each piece was a little larger than my thumb.  How was I going to be able to fill these with cheese and ham and fry them into something edible?  Thank goodness dough is stretchy and forgiving.  I rolled out about two of those, and decided I was done with this game.  Pam to the rescue again!  She volunteered to roll out the rest of the pieces.

     Meanwhile, Sarah showed up.  I set her up to work on opening the wine while Pam and I worked on the calzones (if you could call them that - they were more like gourmet pizza rolls) and other items we were in the middle of.  I started working on mixing the cheeses, and, once the wine was poured and we were properly hydrated, Sarah helped by cutting up the elusive ham. 



Sarah



     She cut up more than I needed, so I used the rest for the impromptu pizza.  For that, I rolled out the dough, poured on some leftover spaghetti sauce from earlier in the week into which I mixed a couple of spoonfuls of chopped garlic.  Then, I spread on the extra ham.  I dug out the leftover grilled chicken we had for dinner on Tuesday night and put that on it.  Jennifer had sent a red pepper over with Pam, so I put that on there, as well.  A couple more stirs of the refrigerator contents, and I got out some shredded Swiss and some shredded mozzarella.  Viola!  Insty-impromptu pizza!

    When Pam was at the grocery store and had gone back inside to get some ham, she was cornered by the sample-givers (I don't think it was very tough for them to get her attention).  She tried everything that they had to offer, then fell victim to the trap of the tastee....  She felt obligated now to purchase one of the items she had sampled.  She settled on the sausage calzone (how appropriate), and brought that over as an auxiliary appetizer.  Once the calzone was done baking, and Pam cut it into 6 pieces for us to nibble on while we were getting everything else prepared.

     Now Karen and Patrick had arrived, along with my husband (separately, but almost simultaneously).  Jeff and Patrick disappeared outside to compare their toys.  We just traded two jet skis for a black '89 Corvette, and Patrick has a black '72 Corvette.  We thought that they were going to go for a ride, so we were debating eating their portions of the calzone.  We heard the car start, and the engine rev up.  Then, we didn't hear it any more.  There was another sound outside, so Pam peeked out the window to discover, they never left on an adventure, they were just sitting in the car, pushing buttons. 

     At this point, I decided it was time to start frying the mini-calzones.  Pam had already filled them with the ham and cheese I had combined and made them into beautiful little fry-able packets.  I started throwing them into the oil that had been heating in my fryer for the past 20 minutes.  She must have put a really good seal on them, because they puffed up and floated on top of the oil, which meant that only one side was getting fried.  I had to flip them.  Since my fryer is so small, I had to do them in batches of three.  I wanted them all to be done at the same time, so I threw the finished batches onto a pizza stone in the oven that had just started warming up to the temperature we set it for the Raspberry pizzas.  I had the oil set at 375º (the highest temperature my fryer will allow), and I still couldn't get a browning action.  I decided to pull them anyway and throw them onto the preheated pizza stone.

     Once everyone was gathered and ready to eat salad and pizzettes, I popped the impromptu pizza into the oven.



Impromtu Pizza



Ham & Cheese Pizzettes

     Even though they were sort of blonde, the pizzettes had a nice crisp exterior and a gooey middle.  Some of the cheese in some of them had leaked out, but there was still enough remaining in the pocket to make a tasty snack.  I was really wishing that there were more of these.  There were only enough for each of us to have one!  It was a tragedy!

     The raspberry pizzas took longer to bake than I had expected, but they were well worth the wait.  The crust was light - a cross between a cookie and a scone and delicrious and could have stood on its own, but it didn't have to today.  The almond "paste" had cooked out its grittiness and pumped up the almond flavor of the tea cake, while holding the raspberries firm to the cake.  The tart raspberries cut the thickness of the crust and the paste for perfect balance.  The white chocolate was completely lost in all of the almond flavor, but it really wasn't missed.  (By the way, the free form ones didn't do so well:  All of the "paste" ran off of the crust and became one with the pan, and gluing the cookies to the pan).

     Our drink of the week was called Plank Walker.  It was Johnnie Red, sweet vermouth, and green chartreuse (the recipe called for yellow chartreuse, but I had green, and how many chartreuses does one household need anyway (the correct answer is none)).  It was thick and sweet with undertones of moss and black licorice.  It wasn't a hit with any of us that tried it (Sarah wasn't drinking, Jeff believes scotch should never be mixed, Patrick wasn't interested, and Jen and Roger got there after we decided that the drink wasn't a great hit).  Karen and I decided that the flavor wasn't terrible, it was just a little strong.  We tried adding soda to dilute it a bit.  That helped, but it still wasn't a favorite.  Far be it for us to pour it out, though.  We all finished our beverages like troupers.

     For round two, I thought maybe we should tred on ground we already knew.  Sarah had posed the question:  What is your favorite "go-to" drink.  Mine is usually a straight up vodka martini with a twist of lime or a gin & tonic, depending on what the weather is like.  Pam said hers was a chambord martini.  Sarah asked Pam what she usually puts in hers...  Pam said "what do you mean?  I just order it, and it comes already made!".  I started thinking about chambord martinis and thought that was a perfect little treat to round out the evening.  I mixed vodka (filled the shaker 3/4 full of vodka), a splash of Chambord, and a dribble of Van der Humm (tangerine liqueur).  A couple of those, and all was right with the world again!

     What is your favorite "go-to" drink?





The Aftermath