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!

.

     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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Bloody Mary Pizza; Goat Cheese and Banana Pepper Pizza; and the Last Word

     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.

CRANBERRY GOAT CHEESE AND BANANA PEPPER PIZZA

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.

BLOODY MARY PIZZA

Adapted from Revolutionary Pizza by Dimitri Syrnkin-Nikolau

Dough:
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.

 THE LAST WORD

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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