Pretty Good Pizza

The cold, half-eaten pizza is displayed, but not without a certain yumminess.


If you read the blog regularly, you may recall that I am not the greatest fan of pizza, at least the general greasy cheese variety. And no matter what, I don't ever want to eat it more than once every two weeks, so this puts me at odds with our society, but hey, alienation is nothing new.

I do, however, like my own pizza. Wouldn't you know? How is it different?

I buy the crust at the grocery store, either frozen or at the bread counter. A ball of yeast dough. Then, I scour what's in the house. Right now, we have a feast period.

Garlic, olive oil, home grown tomatoes, basil, sage, onion, red and green peppers, arugula.

Zowie! I bought some grated mozzarella. Yikes, the price of cheese has skyrocketed. Also bought some pepperoni. The quantities of pepperoni they force you to buy is absurd. This will yield about 6 pizzas. But it keeps. I also bought a small stalk of broccolli. Are you getting the idea? Veggies to the max.

A layer of garlic oil, a sprinkle of cheese, tomatoes and veggies, pepperoni, more cheese, and topped with parmesan flakes. Oh yum! Into a 500 degree oven until the crust is brown. Leave off the pepperoni and you have a wonderful vegetarian pizza.

Makes us two meals, because the topping is so generous. Love those hot melting tomatoes. Yum, yum, yum.

Grapeshot

First Tomatoes and Insalata Caprese

In our own little garden plot, planted and maintained by us, we had two tomatoes ripen this week, medium size, not cherry. The basil is also coming into its own. Time for Insalta Caprese.

Insalata Caprses is one of the most delicious and simplist things you can make. Hey, even a kid can do this. Recipe:

Pick however many tomatoes you need, from one to four. Pick some fresh basil. Carry your produce into the house.

Here you will need a cutting board and a platter. Get out the EVOO, salt and pepper grinder. From the fridge, get out a nice ball of fresh mozzarella. Slice the tomatoes thinly and put on a platter. For each tomato slice, cut an equally thin slice of mozzarella. Cheese goes on tomatoes. Chop up the basil and sprinkle on the cheese/tomato slices. Salt (judiciously) and pepper, a few grinds. Drizzle the platter with EVOO.

Carry this into the dining room and use nice utensils and put out some decent bread. Sop up the tomato and EVOO juices with the bread. A glass of crisp white wine will make the experience even better.

This is so simple that you need to use the best tomatoes, basil, cheese, EVOO and the pepper has to be freshly ground.

It's a fantastic summer luncheon.

Grapeshot