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.

Return to the Chipotle Blueberry Date Pizza recipe.

Pepperoni Pizza and Deconstructed Jalapeno Popper Pizza

     Here I am again, back to the basics.  A pepperoni pizza.  Yes, we have done this before, but not with this crust, and not with this sauce.  Sometimes, little changes, little nuances can make all the difference in the world.  This crust that I have been making out of The Pizza Bible has been outstanding.  I thought my crust was good before, but this just takes to a whole new level.  This little gem of a pizza recipe was hiding in the introduction to the book.  I had already skipped over it, thinking it was instructions on the basics.  I didn't need to read about the basics - I have been making pizzas for years!

     In my opinion, there are several reasons why restaurants (or any other business, for that matter) fail, but one of them is the resistance to change.  If you have done something successfully, why change?  However, I believe that by changing, learning new things about old things, and combining them with your knowledge of how things always used to be, you can really create a masterpiece.  I decided to read the introduction and see if I could learn anything new.  And, here was this tutorial on how to create a great pizza.  I wanted to try it and see how it compared to the "old way" of doing things.  That, and I do really love pepperoni.

     The instructions started on day one of a three day process.  So, I started on Monday.  Monday's events started with weighing and measuring ingredients for the dough.  Okay, I didn't do that (the weighing part) before with the first couple of recipes I tried in this book, but I was willing to try to get down to the letter and try the author's methods.

     The weighing of ingredients was a little tough, considering all I have for a scale is a $19 jobbie that I bought at Costco on a whim one day.  It does measure grams, as the author instructs to measure everything by, but it only reports in two gram increments, and it starts at four grams.  So, measuring 4½ grams of active dry yeast was not going to be exact, nor 9 grams of sea salt, 9 grams of diastatic malt, etc.  Apparently, everything in this book should amount to an odd number of grams.  I did the best I could, though, and it seemed to be matching up to the described results in the book.

     The author chronicled each and every step and explained why each step was done.  I rather enjoyed that.  I had an education.  He instructed to knead the dough on a non-floured surface and suggested a granite surface.  I was in luck!  I have granite counter tops, and they were clean (a rarity, yes, but at that moment, they were clean).  I kneaded the dough as described in the book.  I have never been a kneader.  It seems like a superfluous step.  I was never really sure why it was done and figured whatever it was achieving (I assumed a better mix of dough), it could be done by my KitchenAide.  There was something therapeutic about it though.  Stretching and folding and smashing the dough with my palm.  I felt it was a surrogate for all of those people who had ever done me wrong.  Take THAT, Jack Goldenberg!  Take THAT, Super Ford Smasher lady at Bobby & Steve's.  Take THAT, rude lady in the Cub line!  I smash your face in with the palm of my hand, and your rubbery smushy white face gets pummeled into the granite.

     Okay, I may have gotten a little carried away with it, but I was sold.  Now, I will be kneading my dough for three minutes every week.  The dough was smooth and round and elastic and ready for forming into a ball.  Once formed, I covered it with a kitchen towel and let it "rest" for an hour (at this point I needed a rest, too, even though it had only been three minutes of pummeling).  Following the rest (for both of us), I dribbled a little water over the top of it, put it back in my mixing bowl, and blanketed it with a piece of plastic wrap.  Into the refrigerator it went for it's 24 hour "fermentation" process.

     Day two (Tuesday) involved degassing the dough, making the sauce, and making a garlic oil.  I won't bore you with all of the details.  If you want them - buy the book (ha!).  This is just the Cliff Notes version (do they have those any more?).            

     After degassing, balling, and returning the dough to the fridge for another "rest", I started on the sauce.  Here is where I fudged a little.  I deviated from the instructions just a bit.  I cannot seem to find anything labeled "ground tomatoes" at any of the stores I have been to.  What is that?  The recipe called for 4½ ounces (why did he switch from grams?) of ground tomatoes.  Is that like pureed tomatoes?  I was betting on it.  Why buy pureed, when whole tomatoes and a VitaMix will do.  So, I measured out 4½ ounces (my scale will measure ounces in odd numbers and fractions) of whole plump tomatoes from a can and placed them in my VitaMix with the tomato paste, oregano, salt, and olive oil.  In less than two seconds, the tomatoes were "ground" with the rest of the ingredients I had put in there.  I dumped the slurry into a bowl and added the "hand-crushed" tomatoes to finish off the sauce.

     

PEPPERONI PIZZA

Adapted from The Pizza Bible by Tony Gemingnani with Susie Heller and Steve Siegelman

Dough:

1 1/2 teaspoons active dry yeast

3 ounces warm water

3 1/4 cups bread flour

8 ounces ice-cold water

2 teaspoons fine sea salt

2 teaspoons olive oil

Sauce:

3 1/2 ounces canned (drained) whole plum tomatoes, divided

1 ounce tomato paste

Pinch of dried oregano

Pinch of fine sea salt

1/2 teaspoon olive oil

The rest of the story:

Cornmeal

6 ounces shredded mozzarella

4 ounces sliced pepperoni

1 ounce grated Pecorino Romano cheese

1 teaspoon dried oregano

1 tablespoon garlic-infused olive oil

Dough:  Combine the yeast and warm water in a small bowl.  Whisk to combine.  Set aside.  Place the flour in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the dough hook attachment.  With the mixer running on low speed, add the ice water, followed by the yeast mixture.  Increase the speed of the mixer a little bit and continue mixing until the dough starts to come together.  Add the salt and mix on low for about a minute.  Add the oil, and mix again until the oil is incorporated, and the dough starts to cling to the hook.  Remove the dough from the bowl and knead for about three minutes on a clean, unfloured, smooth surface, such as granite or marble. Place the dough back into the bowl and cover with a clean, damp, lint-free towel.  Let it rest at room temperature for about an hour.  Spread a few drops of water over the dough.  Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and refrigerate for about 24 hours.  Remove the dough from the refrigerator and mix the dough in the stand mixer at low for about thirty seconds to "degass".  Cut the dough in half and shape each half into a ball. Wrap one ball in plastic wrap or seal in a zip-top bag and freeze or reserve it for another use.  Place the remaining ball on a baking sheet and wrap plastic wrap around the pan and dough together.  Put the pan in the refrigerator for another 24 hours.

Sauce:  Place 2½ ounces of the plum tomatoes, the tomato past, oregano, sea salt, and olive oil in the bowl of  a food processor or blender.  Puree until smooth.  Transfer the mixture to a small bowl.  Tear the remaining tomatoes into pieces with your hands and add to the mixture.  Stir the mixture to distribute the tomato pieces throughout the sauce.

Assemble:  Preheat the oven to 500º F with a pizza stone inside, if using.  Roll or stretch the dough into a 15 inch circle on a cornmeal dusted pizza peel or board.  Spread the sauce over the prepared dough.  Evenly distribute the mozzarella over the dough.  Arrange the pepperoni over the cheese.  Transfer the pizza to the preheated stone, if using, or transfer to a pizza pan and place in the oven.  Bake for 10 minutes or until the pepperoni has started to crisp.  Remove the pizza from the oven and dust with the Pecorino and oregano.  Drizzle lightly with the garlic oil.

     Wednesday, I took a rest from working on the pepperoni pizza and started some preparations for my second pizza.  This pizza had all the elements of a jalapeno popper - those delicious little nuggets of jalapeno stuffed with cream cheese and deep fat fried.  Since my pepperoni pizza dough recipe made two pizzas' worth, I decided to use the second dough for my popper pizza.  

     I started with the batter recipe.  It called for a lager, but I didn't think I could add that the day before.  A little Internet browsing taught me that the bubbles in the beer is what makes the finished breading light and fluffy.  When the beer hits the hot oil, it causes it to foam, creating a light and airy texture in the batter.  Because of this, I decided to just combine the other ingredients and add the beer on Thursday, just before I was ready to batter and fry my jalapenos. Next, I fried up the bacon, sliced the jalapenos, and chopped the onions.

DECONSTRUCTED JALAPENO POPPER PIZZA

Adapted from The Revolutionary Pizza by Dimitri Syrkin-Niolau

Dough:

1 1/2 teaspoons active dry yeast

3 ounces warm water

3 1/4 cups bread flour

8 ounces ice-cold water

2 teaspoons fine sea salt

2 teaspoons olive oil

Beer Batter:

1/3 cup all-purpose flour

4 ounces Modelo Negro

1 egg

1 1/2 teaspoons fine sea salt

1/2 cup milk

1 teaspoon lemon juice

The rest of the story:

1/4 cup all-purpose flour

6-8 medium sized (or 3 large) fresh jalapenos,sliced into rings

Salt and pepper

Cornmeal - for dusting the pizza peel

3-5 cups vegetable oil - enough to submerge the jalapenos while frying

2 ounces shredded mozzarella cheese

4 ounces Neufchatel cheese

2 ounces shredded sharp cheddar cheese

2 ounces crisp thick-cut bacon, broken into small pieces

1/2 cup chopped green onions

Dough:  Combine the yeast and warm water in a small bowl.  Whisk to combine.  Set aside.  Place the flour in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the dough hook attachment.  With the mixer running on low speed, add the ice water, followed by the yeast mixture.  Increase the speed of the mixer a little bit and continue mixing until the dough starts to come together.  Add the salt and mix on low for about a minute.  Add the oil, and mix again until the oil is incorporated, and the dough starts to cling to the hook.  Remove the dough from the bowl and knead for about three minutes on a clean, unfloured, smooth surface, such as granite or marble. Place the dough back into the bowl and cover with a clean, damp, lint-free towel.  Let it rest at room temperature for about an hour.  Spread a few drops of water over the dough.  Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and refrigerate for about 24 hours.  Remove the dough from the refrigerator and mix the dough in the stand mixer at low for about thirty seconds to "degass".  Cut the dough in half and shape each half into a ball. Wrap one ball in plastic wrap or seal in a zip-top bag and freeze or reserve it for another use.  Place the remaining ball on a baking sheet and wrap plastic wrap around the pan and dough together.  Put the pan in the refrigerator for another 24 hours.

Make the fried jalapenos:  Mix the batter ingredients together, and whisk to remove any lumps.  Add the jalapeno slices and set aside for ten minutes.  Mix the flour and salt and pepper together.  Preheat the vegetable oil to 375º F.  If you don't have a thermometer, put the pan of oil over a high flame for several minutes.  Drop a dollop of batter in the oil.  If it sizzles and starts to brown immediately, it is ready.  Turn the heat down to medium-high to maintain the temperature.  Roll the batter-soaked jalapenos in the seasoned flour and drop them into the hot oil.  Cook until browned.  Remove the jalapenos from the oil and place on a paper-towel-lined plate to drain.

The Rest of the Story:  Preheat the oven to 500º F with a pizza stone inside, if using.  Roll or stretch the dough into a 15-inch circle on a cornmeal dusted pizza peel or board.  Top the stretched dough with mozzarella and transfer dough to the preheated stone, or transfer to a greased pizza pan and place in the oven.  Bake for 5-7 minutes or until crust is starting to set up, and cheese has melted.  Transfer the pizza back to the pizza peel (or place the pizza pan on a hot pad), leaving the oven on.  Spread the Neufchatel cheese over the mozzarella.  Distribute the fried jalapenos over the cheese.  Top with the cheddar.  Bake for 3-5 more minutes.  Top with the chopped bacon and green onions.

     On Thursday, as soon as I got home, I took the dough out of the refrigerator.



Again, I started with the pepperoni pizza, spreading the sauce over my newly rolled out dough.

As per the instructions, the cheese went on next.  Normally, I object to the cheese on the bottom, because you cannot get the warm, brown, bubbliness that is so wonderful.  However, since I was trying new methods, I thought I would give it a shot.  (There's nothing wrong with crispy browned pepperonis, either).

     We started putting on the pepperoni.  And, putting it on, and putting it on.  I never realized how much pepperoni was in four ounces!

  When it came out of the oven, the pepperoni looked like it was self-deep-fat-fried.  It was shiny and crisp, and it had shrunk up a little to reveal the gooey cheese underneath.

When I added the Pecorino, it melted into the pepperoni.

I have to say, I think it was probably the best pepperoni pizza I have ever had.  The crust had a nice crispness to the outside, the inside of the crust was fluffy and flavorful.  The pepperoni was both crispy on top and meaty underneath.  The sauce was great, too.  The tomato flavor was hearty, yet not overpowering.

We, of course had to make the obligatory frozen pizza for the picky people.

Again, the jalapeno pizza started with the cheese on the bottom, and this time it was truly on the bottom.  And, it was baked some before the toppings went on.

It seemed a shame to cover up the gorgeous, bubbly cheese, but I was covering it with cream cheese, so how could that be bad?

The lovely, deep fried jalapenos went over the cream cheese (at least the ones that didn't go in my mouth).

A little more cheese went over the fried jalapenos.

After another short stint in the oven, the bacon and green onions went on.

This was truly a delicious pizza.  Again, the crust was perfect.  The creaminess of the Neufchatel tempered the heat of the jalapenos and evened out the saltiness and zip of the onions. Surprisingly, the jalapenos stayed somewhat crisp, and the entire piece of pizza was a treasure chest of textures and flavors.