Seared Swordfish Pizza

from the Everything Pizza Cookbook by Belinda Hulin



     My sister, Pam, and I have been trying to lose weight for the last month or so.  Actually, we have been trying for almost our entire lives, really, but now we are really concentrating.  She is much better at it than I am.  She has given up alcohol, which I am not prepared to do right now.  I enjoy it too much.  I love the different flavors of it.  I love combining different liqueurs together to make something different, something that tastes like a food item, but in liquid form, something that makes people smile.  I love pairing different wines or drinks with food to change the flavor of both or enhance the flavor of either.  I like the smell, I like the look of it clinging to the glass, and I like the cool, slick feeling on my tongue.  I am not opposed to reducing my intake, though, or designating certain days as alcohol-free for the sake of finding my waist again.

     That being said, since Pam was my only guest, I decided to forgo the traditional drink of the week.  Actually, I just changed it up a little bit.  I poured some Crystal Light Grapefruit over ice in a tall glass, squeezed a lemon into it, and popped an umbrella straw into the glass for flare.  It was delicious.  It was fruity and tart without being too sweet.  A perfect summer quaff.

     As for the entrees of the evening, since it was just two of us, I decided to postpone the Okono Mi-Yaki that was scheduled for a time when there were more people to eat it.  It is a fried mini pizza recipe, and I figured that it would be better if we had to spread the calories among more people.

     It was a beautiful day.  It was a little chilly - roughly 60 degrees - but the sun was shining and there was no wind.  I was ready to grill again tonight.  I rolled out the dough and built my mise en place.

     I had set the tomatoes for the fresh tomatoes in a colander the refrigerator Wednesday night to drain.  I was very happy that I still am harvesting tomatoes from my garden in mid October.  I sprinkled a little olive oil, salt, and pepper over them and stirred in ribbons of basil from the plant Mary Burdick, Pam's neighbor and friend, gave me.  I eyeballed the amount, because I only needed 1/8 of the amount of the recipe.

     The ingredient list called for thinly sliced mozzarella.  Perhaps the author didn't mean for me to use fresh mozzarella, because I discovered that it doesn't really slice very well, and there really doesn't seem to be a way to make the slices thin.  I placed my blobs of mozzarella and my slices of provolone in a bowl and stacked it on the rolled out dough next to the bowl of tomatoes.

     I put the cute little piece of swordfish I bought at Cub on a plate with a knife (to cut it after searing it) and placed that on the pizza paddle as well.  I added the little containers I had made of lemon zest, capers, and parsley.  I hefted the fully loaded paddle in one hand and my fabulous beverage in my other hand and assigned Pam to her own drink and the door duties.  With that, we headed outside.  I forgot to remind her that the door needed to be unlocked before she shut it after us, so I was thankful that she remembered.  With my husband in Iowa, the back yard gates locked, and no one nearby with a spare key, we could have been in a pickle.

     After the grill had heated up for a while, I placed the dough on one side and the fish on the other.  I wanted the grates good and hot, so when the fish hit them, there would be an instant sear.  After just a couple of minutes, I took both items off.  The grill marks on both were beautiful.

     Once the pizza was assembled, I turned off two of the burners on the grill, Pam scooted the pizza off of the paddle and onto the cooler side of the grill. 

     Unfortunately, the finished product was so beautiful, we were too excited to eat it to take any pictures of it.  The cheese had all melted together to completely cover the pizza.  The provolone was thin and the mozzarella had melted into thinness (I wonder how I can achieve that), so you could see all the ingredients hidden underneath: the perfect o's of the sliced olives, the cubes of fish, big fat capers, and gorgeous tomato chunks.

     We fixed ourselves another fruit drink and dove in.  It was fabulous!  It was even better than I imagined it would be.  I was reluctant to actually put the capers on the pizza, because they are not my favorite ingredient.  In fact, I rather dislike them, but I was surprised.  They added a salty, vegetal tang to the creamy cheese.  It was the perfect compliment to the lemon zest and tomatoes.  The fish was tender, flavorful, and meaty.  If I hadn't known it was fish, I would have guessed pork.  The crust was cooked perfectly - it had a crisp exterior with a nice chew in the middle.

     The whole package was delicious and the company exemplary.