Grilled Garlic Tomato Toast and Chipotle Blueberry Date Pizza

  It's time to start grilling again, but I'm easing into it.  Last week, we grilled grapes (OK, Roger grilled the grapes), this week it was bread (yes, Roger did that, too).  I'm not sure if grilling it as opposed to broiling or toasting makes much of a difference in flavor or texture.  This was not the recipe to determine that, however, because the tomatoes sogged up the bread once they were applied.  Might have to rethink how this one was constructed.  It was simple, but oh-so-delicious.  The bread was grilled, as I mentioned, and then we rubbed cut fresh garlic cloves over the bread on both sides.  Then, halved tomatoes were rubbed over the bread as well - which is where the sogginess came in.  Then, we sprinkled one side of the bread with black sea salt flakes.  It was zingy - almost hot - from the fresh garlic.  The tomatoes mellowed it out a little bit, and the salt just brought it all back again.
     The pizza that I chose for this week sounded so strange, I just had to try it.  But, alas!  It contained figs, and figs were no where to be found, even in the dried version.  Apparently, figs are in season from June to September, and I probably should have postponed this pizza until then, but I was afraid I would forget to go back to it.  I started at Costco.  There were no fresh figs (obviously), but I thought they would certainly  have them in their dried fruit aisle.  They did not.  I went to Cub, because I have purchased them there before and have seen them on numerous occasions.  In the produce department, they had a large sign indicating that there should be dried figs in that section, and it even listed a price, but there was only celery there.  I asked the boy stocking the peppers.  He looked at me like I was from Mars.  I explained that there was a sign over the shelf to the left that had a price on it for figs, but there was only celery there.  He said, "we probably don't have them then." and went back to stocking.  I asked another guy that was stocking onions.  He went right to the organic section and picked up a package of dates, examined them, then came back and told me they didn't have any figs.
     He got me thinking, though.  Figs are sweet.  Dried figs are even sweeter.  The dried versions are soft and sugary, much like a date, and I had a freezer full of dates from my parents' trip to Palm Springs last year.   It was decided, then.  This would be a date pizza, and I would get "freezer points" from Jeff for using something we already had.  And, it would be double points, because I already had chipotles in adobo in my freezer from the last recipe I made with them that only called for 1 teaspoon of the sauce, and I had a six ounce can of them.
     Wednesday, I started with the sauce.  The ingredient list simply said "3 oz canned chipotle peppers in adobo sauce".  It didn't say whether I was just supposed to use the sauce or just the peppers or a little bit of both.  I decided that since the berries and the peppers were going to be the sauce, that there probably should be some of the adobo sauce in there, and I didn't want to miss out on the peppers themselves, so I used both.
     Once I learned that I was cooking the berries down with the peppers, I wondered why it called for fresh blueberries specifically.  I think that frozen blueberries would work equally as well, and they may even be less expensive.  However, Jeff loves blueberries, so I guess fresh was just fine for us.

BLUEBERRY CHIPOTLE DATE PIZZA

Adapted from Revolutionary Pizza by Dimitri Syrkjin-Nikolau

Dough:

1c + 1 tablespoon cold water

1 teaspoon salt

2 tablespoons sugar

1 tablespoon olive oil

2 teaspoons active dry yeast

3½ cups bread flour

Sauce:

1 cup fresh (or frozen) blueberries

3 ounces chipotle peppers in adobo sauce (use both sauce and peppers)

The rest of the story:

4 ounces shredded mozzarella cheese

½ cup barbecue sauce

1 cup dates, chopped and pits removed

6 ounces raw bacon

4 ounces shredded sharp cheddar cheese

Make the dough:  In the bowl of a large stand mixer, whisk together the water, salt, sugar, and oil.  Add the yeast and whisk again.  Attach the dough hook to the mixer.  Add the flour and mix at medium speed until the dough comes together and clings to the hook.  Remove the dough and knead by hand for about three minutes or until the dough becomes smooth.  Place the dough in a bowl and cover with a damp, lint-free towel.  Let rest in a warm place for two hours.  Divide the dough in half.  At this point, place one half in a zip lock bag and freeze for another use.  Shape the remaining half into a ball and place on a baking sheet.  Wrap the baking sheet and dough in plastic wrap and refrigerate.  Remove the dough 1 hour before you are going to use it, if possible.

Make the sauce:  Combine the peppers, adobo sauce, and blueberries in a small sauce pan.  Cook together over medium heat for about twenty minutes, stirring often.  Remove from heat and allow it to cool.  Place mixture in a blender and puree until smooth.

The rest of the story:  Chop the bacon into small pieces and fry over medium high heat until it just starts to brown and crisp.  Remove bacon from the pan, and put it on a paper towel lined plate to drain.  It will continue to crisp as you remove it and as it cools.  Preheat the oven to 500º F with a pizza stone inside, if using.  Roll or stretch the dough out to a 15 inch circle on a cornmeal dusted pizza peel or board.  Sprinkle the mozzarella over the prepared dough.  Drizzle the barbecue sauce over the cheese.  Arrange the dates over the barbecue sauce and cheese.  Sprinkle the bacon over everything.  Cover the pizza with the cheddar cheese.  Transfer pizza to the preheated stone or place on a greased pizza pan and put in the oven.  Bake for 10-15 minutes or until cheese is melted and starts to brown.  Drizzle (or dollop) the blueberry chipolte mixture over the pizza, spreading any thick dollops around to prevent any one particular spot from getting too spicy.

     I washed the berries and noticed that some of them still had a little stem on them.  I suppose it would have been fine to leave those on, since it was going to be cooked down and blended up, but I went through the effort of picking them all off anyway.

     It didn't take long for the combination to "sauce" up, and their twenty minute stint on the burner thickened it up quite nicely.  A quick zap in the VitaMix, and it was smooth and luscious.

     Next preparatory task was to fry up the bacon.  I had weighed the bacon before I started, and it was six ounces and looked like a very large amount for one pizza.  I chopped it up and threw it in a cast iron skillet on high.  I pulled the pan off of the burner just before they got crisp.  In the time it took me to remove the pieces and put them on a paper-towel-lined plate, they reached the crisp point.  I weighed it again, just for curiosity sake, and it was only 1.9 ounces after it was cooked.  1.7 ounces after I sampled it to make sure it was worthy of the pizza.

     On Thursday, while Roger was grilling the bread, and Jennifer was halving the garlic and tomatoes, I rolled out the dough and started removing the pits from my figs (er, I mean, dates).  

     I sprinkled the mozzarella over the dough I had rolled out before the Liggetts arrived, and swirled barbecue sauce over the cheese.  I used the same bottle of Sweet Baby Ray's that I had used for the pork pizza two weeks ago ("fridge points!"), and then I scattered my chopped dates over the swirls of sauce.  They weren't chopped so much as mushed apart.  They were very soft and very sticky.  

     Next went the bacon (or what was left of it).  The original recipe had instructed to bake the pizza at this point and toss the cheddar on after it came out of the oven.  I didn't like that idea.  I wanted to make sure that my cheddar was melted and maybe even a little brown.
     Meanwhile, Jennifer had finished up the garlic tomato toast, and cut it up for us to snack on while the pizza was baking.  I have to say they weren't very attractive, but they were delicious!

GRILLED BREAD WITH FRESH TOMATO AND GARLIC

Adapted from Patio Pizzeria by Karen Adler & Judith Fertig

4 large slices of sourdough bread or 8 small ones

4 fresh garlic cloves, peeled and halved

4 ripe tomatoes, halved

2 teaspoons (4 pinches) black sea salt flakes

1 tablespoon good-quality extra virgin olive oil 

Preheat a gas or charcoal grill to medium-high.  Place the slices of bread on the grill and toast for a few minutes on each side or until grill marks appear on the bread.  Remove the bread from the grill.  Rub the garlic over both sides of the bread.  Then, rub each side of the bread with tomato, squeezing as much pulp as you can onto the bread.  Sprinkle with the sea salt and drizzle with oil.

     I took the pizza out of the oven when the edges had browned, and the cheese had melted.  With all of the brown ingredients on the pizza, I couldn't really tell if the cheese was browning a little or if the bacon or dates or barbecue sauce was just poking through.  Either way, it looked good.

     When I took the blueberry chipolte sauce out of the refrigerator, I took one look at it and knew it was not going to drizzle very well.  I put the bowl of it in the microwave for a few seconds, hoping to loosen it up a bit, but it was still pretty thick.  I ended up spooning it on in dollops and trying to spread the dollops out to make it look like it was drizzled.  I don't think I was very successful at achieving this effect.

     I had warned Jennifer that this week's pizza was a little in left field, and asked her to bring something that picky people would eat.  She brought the five-meat pizza from Costco.  It's always a good choice, and it never hurts to have a backup plan in case the new pizza recipe doesn't work out.

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Return to the Grilled Garlic Tomato Toast recipe.

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Grilled Grape, Blue Cheese, and Pecan Salad with Overstuffed Carnivore Pizza

     Meat, meat, and more meat.  Oh, and there were vegetables and cheese, too!  This really was an overstuffed pizza.  Of course we needed to balance out all that heaviness with a "light" salad.  Grapes and nuts were the perfect foil for all of the richness of the main event.

OVERSTUFFED CARNIVORE PIZZA

Adapted from The Pizza Bible by Tony Gemignani

Dough:

2½ teaspoons active dry yeast

5 ounces warm water

4½ cups bread flour

¼ cup cornmeal

1 tablespoon + 2 teaspoons distatic malt

2 tablespoons lard

2 tablespoons unsalted butter

6 ounces cold water

2 tablespoons fine sea salt

Sauteed Vegetables:

6 tablespoons olive oil, divided

7 ounces thinly sliced red onion

1½ teaspoons fine sea salt, divided

8 ounces baby portabella mushrooms

1 large red bell pepper, cut into strips

Stuffing:

2 tablespoons of butter

9 ounces thinly sliced fresh mozzarella cheese

8 ounces Italian style meatballs (about 16 medium-sized balls)

2 ounces sliced pepperoni

9 ounces (uncooked) alabrese sausage (or other spicy bulk sausage)

5 ounces (uncooked) sweet fennel sausage (or other mild or sweet bulk sausage)

2 tablespoons grated Pecorino cheese

4 ounces shredded mozzarella cheese

4 ounces shredded colby jack cheese

Sauce:

3 ounces tomato paste

5 ounces canned whole plum tomatoes

½ teaspoon oregano

1 teaspoon olive oil

Finishing Touches:

1 tablespoon garlic infused olive oil

1 tablespoon of grated Pecorino cheese

1 teaspoon dried oregano

4 ounces whole milk ricotta cheese

Make the dough:  Put the yeast in a small bowl and add the warm water.  Whisk vigorously until well-combined.  Combine the flour, cornmeal and malt in the bowl of a large stand mixer fitted with the dough hook.  With the mixer running on low, add the lard and butter.  Pour in the cold water and the yeast mixture.  Continue mixing at medium speed until the dough comes together and clings to the hook.  Remove the dough and knead by hand for about three minutes or until smooth.  Using a dough cutter, cut one-third of the dough off of the ball.  Form this into a ball and place on a baking sheet, seam side down.  Form the remaining dough into a ball and place on the baking sheet, leaving at least an inch between the two balls.  Wrap plastic wrap around the pan and over the dough balls.  Refrigerate for at least 24 hours.  Bring the dough balls up to room temperature before shaping.

Sautee the vegetables:  Add 2 tablespoons of olive oil to a large skillet.  Swirl the oil around the pan to coat.  Heat the oil over medium-high heat.  Add the sliced onions and ½ teaspoon of sea salt.  Stir to coat the onions with oil.  Once the onions start to sizzle, lower the heat to medium and cook, stirring often for about 15 minutes until the onions are soft and starting to brown.  Remove from the pan.  Rinse or wipe the mushrooms with a damp cloth to clean.  Quarter the mushrooms.  Heat 2 tablespoons of oil in the same skillet used for the onions.  Add the mushrooms and ½ teaspoon of salt and stir to combine and coat the mushrooms with oil.  Spread the mushrooms into a single layer on the bottom of the pan.  Cook mushrooms until browned on all sides.  Remove them from the pan and set aside.  Heat 2 more tablespoons of oil over medium-high heat, swirling to coat the bottom of the pan.  Add the pepper strips and the remaining ½ teaspoon of salt, stirring to combine and coat with oil.  Cook peppers until they are tender and starting to brown.

Assemble the pizza:  Preheat the oven to 500º F.  Roll or stretch the larger dough ball to about a seventeen inch circle.  Spread two tablespoons of butter on the bottom and inside sides of a 15" deep dish pizza pan.  Carefully place the 17 inch circle in the pan, draping the extra dough over the edges of the pan.  Arrange the mozzarella slices over the bottom and a little up the sides of the dough.  Break up the meatballs and scatter over the mozzarella.  Arrange the pepperoni slices over the meatballs.  Pinch nickel sized pieces of each of the types of sausage and arrange over the pepperoni.  Scatter the onions, mushrooms, and peppers evenly over the sausage.  Sprinkle the Pecorino and garlic over the vegetables.  Cover with the mozzarella and colby jack.  Roll the smaller dough ball out to a fifteen inch circle.  Carefully place the circle over the toppings on the pizza.  Roll the overhanging dough from the bottom of the pizza to meet the top circle of dough, pinching the two doughs together all around the pan.  Using a sharp knife, cut two or three slits in the top dough for venting.  Transfer pizza to the oven and bake for 12 minutes.  Rotate the pan 180º and bake for another 12 minutes (you may want to put a pie ring or tinfoil around the edges of the crust if it is browning too quickly).

Make the sauce:  While the pizza is baking, start the sauce.  place all of the ingredients in a blender and puree.

Finishing Touches:  Take the pizza out of the oven and let it rest for ten minutes.  Run a butter knife or thin spatula around the edges of the pan to loosen the pizza from the pan.  With a large spatula (or two to be safe), lift the pizza out of the pan and place on a cutting board (you may want to put it on a carving board, because juices may run out when you slice it).  Brush the edges of the crust with the garlic oil.  Spoon the sauce over the top of the pizza.  Dust with another tablespoon of Pecorino.  Sprinkle with a teaspoon of oregano.  Dollop the ricotta cheese over the sauce and cheese.  Slice carefully and serve!

     This pizza was more involved than I expected.  Had I read the directions all of the way through (and had I known for sure that anyone was coming over to enjoy it), I would have done more preparing on Wednesday.  As it was, I made the dough on Tuesday, took my sausages and pepperoni out of the freezer to thaw on Wednesday, and that was about it.

     I was scrambling around when Jennifer and Roger got here on Thursday night.  I had no sauce, my vegetables weren't even cut, much less sauteed, and I hadn't even chosen a drink to accompany the meal yet.  I set both of them to work, helping me right away.  OK, I let Roger get a beer first.  Then, I sent him out to the grill with the grapes for the salad.  I set Jennifer up with a cutting board and a bucket of mushrooms.

     Again, had I read the directions all of the way through, I think I would have sauteed the onions and peppers together.  The mushrooms would have had to be done separately to achieve a nice golden brown to them and to keep all of their liquids from gooing up the onions and peppers.

I had already stretched out the dough balls, buttered the pan, and loaded the bottom dough into the pan.  I had also started sauteeing the onions.  While she worked on the mushrooms, I assembled the salad.

GRILLED GRAPE, GORGONZOLA, AND PECAN SALAD

Adapted from Patio Pizzeria by Karen Adler & Judith Fertig

2 bunches of red seedless grapes, rinsed, patted dry, and left in the bunch

2½ ounces crumbled gorgonzola cheese

3½ ounces pecans, toasted and coarsely chopped

Grill the grapes, still in their bunches, over a medium-high flame, using a screen or vegetable grilling tray, until they blister and blacken in spots, about four minutes.  Remove the grapes from the grill and allow to cool.  Remove the grapes from the step and place in a large bowl.  Add the cheese and toasted pecans.  Toss and serve.

I forced Jennifer to multi-task and start assembling the big pizza.  Layer after layer of stuff went into this thing!

     The toppings (stuffings?) had already reached the top of the pan, and we hadn't even added the vegetables and cheese yet.  We were still going, though.

     By the time we got the cheese on, it was mounded over the edge.  It was a good thing this was going to get sealed up, or we would have cheese and vegetables running all over the bottom of my oven!

     We sealed it up as well as we could, stabbed the top dough a few times with a sharp knife for venting and carefully placed it into the oven.  At the halfway mark, we opened the oven to rotate the pizza, and both Jennifer and I burst out laughing.  The dough had risen so much that it was rising right out of the pan, and it looked like a big chef's hat.

     At that point, we should have covered the outer edge with tin foil or with a pie ring, because the edges were getting brown, but we wanted to make sure that the sausage inside was cooked and all the cheese was melted.  We ended up overbrowning the edges of the pizza.

     The extra dough around the edges was helpful for the post-oven directions.  It had created a nice lip to keep in the sauce we had made while the pizza was baking and the additional cheese.

     This was really a hearty pizza.  Jennifer opted to tear the extra lip of crust off, so she could eat more of the interior of the pizza.  I used the extra crust to mellow out the richness of the meat and cheese.  Strangely enough, none of us had seconds. 

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Return to the Grilled Grape, Blue Cheese, and Pecan Salad recipe.

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Pulled Pork and Portabella Pizza; Pepperoni, Green Olive, and Jalapeno Pizza; Gin Hibiscus Martini

     Pulled pork is one of those foods that I never think about until it is right in front of me.  It isn't something I crave out of the blue, and it certainly isn't a staple in our household.   Every time I have it, though, I think, "why don't we have this more often?"  It is made from pork butt or pork shoulder roast, whatever you want to call it.  It is a really inexpensive cut of meat, and if you cook it slowly, it comes out juicy and flavorful without a lot of work.

     That being said, although it doesn't take much effort to make, it does take quite a bit of time.  I started working on the ingredients for this pizza on Monday.  I started with the pork roast.  It had been quite a long time since I had made one, and my memory on the mechanics of it was quite rusty.  The original recipe called for a 1½ roast to start (for two pizzas), cooked at 325º F for 3½ hours.  Well, Jeff and I don't ever do anything small, and as my brother-in-law Roger said, that size roast isn't even worth the effort.  I didn't see the original chunk of meat that Jeff bought for this recipe, but he cut me a 3½ pound piece, gave some of it to my parents, and there are still at least two packages of it in my freezer.

     I wondered how to adjust the time (and temp?) for my more-than-double-sized roast.  I'm not sure if I had a short attention-span, was too impatient, or not google-savvy enough, but I couldn't seem to find a comparable cooking time for this roast.  Jeff and I discussed it and speculated and decided that we should cook it for the 3½ hours, and then just let it sit in the oven with the heat off until it cooled.  We reasoned that we felt that 325º was a little high, and that the time for this size roast shouldn't differ all that greatly from the time for a roast that was two pounds smaller.  The residual heat from the dutch oven and the trapped heat from not opening in the oven would continue to cook it for at least an additional half hour - probably more.  Because the temperature of the oven was relatively low to begin with, it wouldn't burn, and because of the fat content in the roast, it probably wouldn't dry out either.

     I was a little curious on the instructions.  It didn't have me sear the roast first (which I thought every roast recipe started that way) - just salt and pepper and throw it in a dutch oven.  I took it a little further and instead of salt and pepper, I used Harley's Sweet Rib Rub.  This is similar to Lawry's Seasoning Salt, but with a little more pepper and kick to it, and the rub version has some brown sugar added to it for caramelization.  

PULLED PORK AND PORTABELLA PIZZA

Adapted from Revolutionary Pizza by Dimitri Syrkin-Nikolau

Dough:

1 cup cold water

2 teaspoons coarse Kosher salt

2 tablespoons granulated sugar

1 tablespoon olive oil

2 teaspoons active dry yeast

3½ cups bread flour

Roast Pork:

3½ pound pork shoulder roast

2 tablespoons Harley's Sweet Rib Rub

Sauce and Toppings:

8 ounces Negro Modelo (or other dark, rich beer)

½ cup Sweet Baby Ray's barbecue sauce

1 cup and 1 tablespoon olive oil, divided

2 large Portabella mushroom caps (about 4 ounces), cleaned and trimmed

4 ounces shredded mozzarella cheese

4 ounces shredded Mexican Blend cheese

10 3"x3" wonton wrappers, cut into ½" strips

2 green onions, chopped

Make the dough:  Whisk together the water, salt, sugar, olive oil, and yeast in the bowl of a large stand mixer with the dough hook attached.  Add the flour and run the mixer on medium speed until the dough comes together and starts to cling to the dough hook.  Remove the dough from the bowl and knead for about three minutes or until the outside of the dough becomes smooth.  Place dough in a greased bowl, cover with a damp, lint-free towel, and set aside in a warm place for about an hour.  Cut dough in half.  Using your fingers, shape each half into a ball, making sure to seal up any fissures.  Reserve one dough-ball for another use.  Place the other one on a baking sheet, cover sheet and dough in plastic wrap, and refrigerate for 24 hours.  Allow dough ball to come to room temperature before shaping.

Make the pulled pork:  Preheat the oven to 325º F.  Rub the roast generously all over with the seasoning blend.  Place in a Dutch oven and cover with the lid.  Roast for about 3½ hours without removing the lid.  Turn the oven off, but leave the roast in the oven for two hours.  Remove roast from oven and shred with two forks, incorporating any juices that may have collected in the bottom of the pan.

Make the sauce and assemble:  Preheat the oven to 500º F with a pizza stone inside, if using.  Roll or stretch the dough out to a fifteen inch circle on a cornmeal dusted pizza peel or board.  Combine the beer and barbecue sauce in a small sauce pan.  Bring the mixture to a boil over medium-high heat.  Reduce the temperature to low and continue to simmer for about ten minutes or until the mixture has reduced by half.  Let the mixture cool.  Spread the mixture over the prepared dough.  Spread 8 ounces of prepared pork over the barbecue sauce, reserving the remainder for another use.  Brush the cleaned Portabella caps with 1 tablespoon of olive oil.  Grill the mushroom caps over high heat for a few minutes per side or until grill marks appear on the tops.  Slice mushroom caps and scatter over the pork.  Top the pork and mushrooms with the cheeses.  Fill a cast iron skillet with the olive oil, adding more, if needed, to bring the depth up to about an inch up the side of the pan.  Heat oil over medium-high heat.  Fry the wonton strips in batches, trying not to overlap the pieces in the pan, for two or three minutes or until just starting to brown (they will continue to cook when they are out of the pan).  Place fried strips on a paper towel lined plate to drain.  Slide the pizza onto the preheated stone or place in a greased pizza pan and put in the preheated oven.  Bake for 10 minutes or until cheese has melted and is starting to brown a little. Remove the pizza from the oven and top with the wonton strips and the green onions (it may be easier to slice the pizza before adding the strips and onions).

      My whole house filled with the smell of pork. The warm, homey aroma made me drool.  When I took it out of the oven, of course I had to sample it to make sure that it was done properly.  And, oh was it delicious!  As I was shredding the pork, every third fork-full ended up in my mouth.  It was moist and salty and rich.  I had forgotten how good this could be.  Now that we have a couple more of these roasts, I am going to have to put this into the rotation somewhere.
     It was really easy to shred.  I took two forks and just stabbed and twisted until it was one big pile of meaty goodness.
     While the pork was cooking, I decided to work on the sauce.  It called for a quarter cup of barbecue sauce and 4 ounces of beer (it actually called for a porter, but I didn't have one, so I used Modelo Negro) for two pizzas.  I was only making one, but I was going to make all of the sauce anyway.  I would decide later if I was going to use it all for this pizza.
     As the sauce was simmering, I ran outside to the grill to grill my portabella mushrooms.  I swathed them with a little olive oil and put them on the hot grates.  A couple minutes on each side was supposed to do it, but it ended up taking a bit longer than that to get some nice grill marks on the meat of the head.
   The sauce was supposed to simmer for 10 minutes, but I must have been at the grill for longer than that, and I think the sauce was bubbling away on the stove for closer to twenty.  I had about an eighth of a cup of "sauce" when I was done, but it was more the consistency of tar than sauce.

     It was delicious, though.  It was tangy and sweet with a little bitter after taste.  I decided to keep it and try again the next day.  I added this tar to another 4 ounces of Modelo and another quarter cup of barbecue sauce.  This time, I did only give it ten minutes on low, and it turned out beautifully.  It was thick, but not too thick; it was slightly sweet with that tannic finish; and a little bit spicy.
     I still had time before Jennifer and Roger arrived to start on frying my wonton wrappers.  I cut a few extra strips, because I knew I would not be able to resist trying them once they were fried.  And, I was right.  And, Jennifer was unable to resist as well.  It was a good plan.

 

     I had Jennifer start assembling the pork pizza while I scrambled to find ingredients to make another pizza.  I hadn't really picked out a recipe, because I thought, if we needed a second pizza, I could come up with items I already had in the fridge to create one instead of buying another whole set of ingredients.  I could have sworn that I had some bloody mary sauce left over from the pizza we had done the week before, but I ripped that fridge apart and could not find it.  Jeff came home in the middle of it, and I accused him of drinking it.  He flat out denied it, but I know that sauce must have gone somewhere.  Time was wasting, though, and I needed to develop Plan B.

PEPPERONI, GREEN OLIVE, AND JALAPENO PIZZA

Dough:

1 cup cold water

2 teaspoons coarse Kosher salt

2 tablespoons granulated sugar

1 tablespoon olive oil

2 teaspoons active dry yeast

3½ cups bread flour

Toppings:
3 Roma tomatoes, seeded and chopped
1 teaspoon dried basil
4 ounces pepperoni slices
2 ounces small pimento stuffed green olives, left whole
3 ounces pickled sliced jalapenos
8 ounces of shredded mozzarella cheese

Make the dough:  Whisk together the water, salt, sugar, olive oil, and yeast in the bowl of a large stand mixer with the dough hook attached.  Add the flour and run the mixer on medium speed until the dough comes together and starts to cling to the dough hook.  Remove the dough from the bowl and knead for about three minutes or until the outside of the dough becomes smooth.  Place dough in a greased bowl, cover with a damp, lint-free towel, and set aside in a warm place for about an hour.  Cut dough in half.  Using your fingers, shape each half into a ball, making sure to seal up any fissures.  Reserve one dough-ball for another use.  Place the other one on a baking sheet, cover sheet and dough in plastic wrap, and refrigerate for 24 hours.  Allow dough ball to come to room temperature before shaping.

Assemble and bake:  Preheat oven to 500º F with pizza stone inside, if using.  Roll or stretch dough out to a fifteen inch circle on a cornmeal dusted pizza peel or board.  Scatter chopped tomatoes over the dough.  Sprinkle dried oregano over the tomatoes.  Arrange all but 9 pepperoni slices over the tomatoes.  Add the olives, distributing evenly over the pizza.  Cover everything with mozzarella cheese.  Arrange the remaining pepperoni decoratively over the cheese.  Transfer to the preheated stone, if using, or transfer to a greased pizza pan and put in the oven.  Bake for 10-12 minutes or until cheese is melted and browning.  Slice and serve.

  This pizza was very similar to the bloody mary pizza we had on a previous Thursday, but I had really enjoyed that pizza and wanted to kick it up a notch with some jalapenos.  I do love jalapenos on pizza.  I always have them add jalapenos when I order delivery.

     Jennifer had brought a 5 meat pizza from Costco, and that had been baking while we were assembling the other two pizzas.  Jeff came home just as that one was done, and we enlisted him for slicing.

     It didn't take long for the other two pizzas to cook, and we pulled those out and prepared for the post oven directions for the pork.

     Jennifer added those lovely, crunchy, wonton skins and some fresh, bright, green onions while I mixed up a cocktail.

GIN HIBISCUS MARTINI

3 ounces gin

½ ounce hibiscus syrup (recipe below)

½ ounce lemon juice

Hibiscus syrup:  Mix equal parts water and sugar in a small sauce pan (I used 4 ounces of water and half a cup of sugar).  Add 1 tablespoon dried hibiscus flowers per every 4 ounces of water.  Boil until sugar dissolves.  Strain liquid into a bowl through a mesh sieve.  Cover and store in the refrigerator until ready to use.

Fill a cocktail shaker with ice.  Pour gin, syrup, and lemon juice over the ice.  Shake vigorously.  Strain into a chilled cocktail glass.  Enjoy!

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     The pork and portabella pizza was wonderful!  It was sweet, spicy, homey, meaty, crunchy.  The pork had just melted into the sauce.  The mushrooms, although we felt they didn't add much to the flavor profile, did add to the moistness of the pork.  The wontons added a nice salty crunch, and the green onions contrasted the sweetness of the sauce beautifully.

     The impromptu pizza was everything I had hoped it would be (except that we burnt the edge of the crust a little bit).  The tomatoes were a nice foil to the salty olives and (mildly) spicy jalapenos.  Leaving the olives whole added a nice little pop to each bite that contained them.  I didn't miss the bloody mary mix at all.

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Lamb, Kalamata Olive, and Feta Pizza With a Greektini

   

 Easter was approaching.  Jennifer and family were in Mexico for Spring Break, and Pam was working.  We knew early in the week that it was just going to be me and Jeff for pizza on Thursday.  Jeff did his usual "meat trolling" on Tuesday.  This is where he lurks around the meat department and hunts for meat that is put on clearance, because it is getting close to its expiration date.  This week's find was some discounted ground lamb.  He suggested that we go off schedule this week and make up our own pizza.  I was game.

LAMB, KALAMATA OLIVE, AND FETA PIZZA

A Jeff and Steph Collaboration

Dough:
8oz. cold water
2 teaspoons salt
2 tablespoons sugar
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 teaspoons active dry yeast
3¼ cup bread flour

Toppings:
10½ ounces whole-milk ricotta cheese
1lb ground lamb
2 teaspoons Greek Seasoning (such as Midwest Rubs brand)
2 small Roma tomatoes, each cut into four slices
2 oucnes yellow onion, thinly sliced
3 ounces whole kalamata olives, pitted
5 cloves of garlic, thinly sliced
1 tablespoon garlic-infused olive oil

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 refrigerator and allow it to come to room temperature.  Preheat the oven to 500º F with a pizza stone inside, if using.  Roll or stretch the dough out to a fifteen inch circle on a cornmeal dusted pizza peel or board.  Spread the ricotta over the prepared dough.  In a large skillet over medium-high heat, cook the lamb with the Greek Seasoning until just barely browned.  Drain.  Scatter the lamb over the ricotta cheese.  Arrange the slices of Roma over the lamb.  Separate the onion slices into rings and evenly distribute the rings over the lamb and tomatoes. Scatter the olives over everything. Add the crumbled feta.  Arrange the garlic slices on the top.  Slide the pizza onto the preheated stone and cook for 10-15 minutes or until the garlic slices start to brown.  Remove the pizza from the oven and drizzle with the garlic-infused olive oil.  Slice and serve.

     With the ground lamb in mind, I had a gyro-type theme started in my head.  While gyros use lamb that has been cooked, processed, and reformed into something resembling meat pieces, I was okay starting out with plain old ground lamb.
     Jeff volunteered to help, and he browned the lamb, while I got the other ingredients ready.  We had a partially used carton of ricotta in the fridge that I wanted to use, so I spread that over the crust.  I was originally going to doctor it up with some seasonings to make it seems somewhat like a tzatziki sauce (the sauce commonly drizzled over gyros), but I had no cucumbers, and Jeff was afraid it would mask the lamb and its seasonings, so plain ricotta won out.

 
                                         He seasoned the meat very simply with a spice blend we picked up at a grilling show that was just simply called "Greek Seasoning".  It's mostly onion powder, garlic powder, and pepper (the rest is a whole lot of big words that I imagine we were never supposed to ingest).  The meat went right over the ricotta.  There was a lot of it, so we could barely see that there was anything underneath.
     Jeff sliced up a couple of romas.  He never does anything small, and this was no exception.  He cut the tomatoes into thick slices - or, rather, slabs.  When I raised my eyebrows at this, he exclaimed, "I want thick slices!"  So, the slabs went on top of the lamb.  It was a good thing Jennifer wasn't here!

     Next, I put paper thin slices of yellow onion over the tomatoes and meat and dotted the entire pizza with whole kalamatas.  I crumbled some feta and scattered that over the top.  It was beautiful and heavy.

                                             While that baked, I worked on my drink.  I thought a Greek-ish pizza needed to have an equally Greek-ish drink.  I rummaged through the liquor cabinet to see what I could come up with.  I found some Ouzo - the quintessential Greek liqueur, and I was off and pouring!

GREEKTINI

3 parts gin (I used Tanqueray)

1 part Ouzo

½ part lemon juice

Pour ingredients into an ice-filled shaker.  Shake.  Strain into a chilled cocktail glass.  Sip, swallow, repeat.

     The pizza was fabulous!  It was creamy and meaty, and the olives gave it the right amount of tang and saltiness.  The garlic slices had crisped up and became nutty and delicious.  Everything came together beautifully.  The only complaint I had about the whole thing was that the olives kept rolling off of the slice before it got to my mouth.  I'm not sure if that is a problem with the pizza or the martini...

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