Pizza, plain and simple

Sarah and I eat Pizza often. Maybe too often. This is the recipe I use and it's done me well so far. A note however: if using mushrooms, saute them in a frying pan before adding them to the pizza. This way all the water in the mushrooms won't gush all over the top of your pizza.

The dough:

Ingredients: For 2 thin-ish pie crusts

3 1/2 cups all purpose flour (or 1 cups whole wheat flour, ~2 cups all purpose)
1 cup warm water
2 1/4 tsp. active dry yeasts
2 Tbs. honey or sugar
1/4 cup olive oil
1 tsp. salt

Prime the yeast in warm water (1/3 part boiling to 2/3 part ice water) for about 10 minutes. If using sugar add to the priming water, if using honey, wait until the first of the flour is added. I've found that yeast don't like honey overmuch.

Add the first cup of flour to the water and mix by hand until just incorporated. Add to this batter the olive oil, honey if using, and salt. Mix this in by hand too.


Begin working in the rest of the flour either by hand or by machine. If using machine, the dough is ready when it starts to climb the dough hook. If doing this by hand, work in as much as you can with a spoon, then turn out onto a floured surface and knead lightly for about three minutes. We're going for a relatively soft dough here, so don't over knead or work in too much flour. We do this, and the crust becomes really tough and unpleasant to eat. Be gentle with the dough; love it, and it will love you...to eat it.

Turn dough out into a lightly oiled bowl. Turn once to coat, cover with a damp towel or plastic wrap, and plop the thing in a warm place to rise for about an hour.

Ta da!

Punch the dough down and turn it out onto a floured surface. Kinda squish it out into the semblance of a round flat shape with the tips of your fingers. Leave it to rest for about 10 minutes. This will allow the gluten in the dough to relax enough so that it will just collapse into the pizza shape when you roll it.

I have no idea how you throw a pizza dough into shape. I've seen it done and it makes no sense to me what-so-ever. It's magic.

The Sauce:

Ingredients: Makes enough for more than one pizza (it freezes well)

1 Tbs. olive oil
2 cloves garlic
1 tsp. oregano
1/2 tsp. red pepper flakes (or more to taste, some like it hot)
1 tsp. red wine vinegar
1 15 oz. can tomato sauce
1 6 oz. can tomato paste
salt to taste

Warm the garlic and red pepper flakes in the olive oil over medium heat. Don't let any of this burn.


Add in the rest of the ingredients and cook over low heat until reduced a bit, about 15 minutes.

The Pizza:
Pre-heat oven to about 475 degrees at least half an hour before the pizza goes in the oven. If you have a pizza stone, great. If so, make it 45 minutes, an hour is better. We want that oven HOT!


Roll out the dough and slap onto a cornmeal dusted pizza peel. Or slap it into a cornmeal dusted cookie sheet; whatever is available. Slather on the sauce. Give the peel a little jiggle so that the dough slides around a little bit, we don't want the dough to stick to the peel. If waiting a while for the oven to heat, shake the peel a few times until baking to keep the dough loose.

Slather on the toppings. In this case: kalamata olives, garden tomatoes, and mozzarella cheese.

Slide the pizza right off the peel onto the hot pizza stone. Bake for about 7 minutes, or until the cheese starts to brown in the center. Slide the pizza out, cut it up, open a beer, and stuff your face.

Stock Variation

Looks like Liz beat me to a veggie stock posting. Had pictures ready to go and everything and she stole my thunder. Damn. This post is just going to be a little pattering of rain in comparison. Excuse my blabbiness in advance.

Quick Stock and Notes on Variations

Ingredients: for 8 cups stock

1 Large Onion
2 Large Carrots
2 Sticks Celery
Salt
Herbs and Spices (Garlic - 8 cloves, bouquet garni: Thyme - 6 sprigs, Parley - 8 branches, Bay leaf - 2. Others to add as they come about: Rosemary, Marjoram, Oregano, Tarragon, etc.)
Mixed Vegetable Trimmings
(Where do these come from? Don't have pounds of vegetables to go through every time you make stock? No problem...that's why freezers were invented. Through the week, as you use up your veggies for other dishes, save those trimmings that will be good for stock and shove them into an old bread bag or ziplock baggie. Stick this in the freezer and continue to fill it up as new veggie scraps come along. When its full, make a batch of stock and start over again.)

Good trimmings:
Leek Greens and Roots, leaves and stems from greens (kale, chard, broccoli rabe, beet), mushroom caps and stems, green onions, potato peelings (organic only please, conventional peelings are relatively toxic by comparison), celery root peelings, stems from old herbs (cilantro, parsley, basil), fennel (stocks and other trimmings), corn cobs, squash (skins and seeds), bell peppers, hard cheese rinds.

Bad trimmings:
Turnips and rutabagas, cabbage and Brussels sprouts, broccoli and cauliflower, red beets (good for borscht though), onion skins, artichoke trimmings, excessive amounts of green leaves (more than 4 cups for 8 cups water), anything that would make you sick if you ate it by itself (rotten things). These things turn bitter when boiled too long and will overpower the deep tastes we're going for.

Ok...

Saute onion, celery, and carrot in butter 5 - 10 minutes. Could add brewer's yeast at this point, which would add a "meaty" flavor to the finished stock for all you veggie eaters out there who still crave the hint of a once living animal in their dishes now and then.

Add in the trimmings and cook over medium heat for another 5 - 10 minutes.

Add the water and some salt to start out. Bring to a boil, then reduce and simmer over medium heat for about 30 minutes. Unlike a meat stock, veggie stock does not benefit from extra boiling; so after 30 minutes, the veggies have given all they're going to give.

Drain through a colander or a sieve and taste for salt.

Variations on the Quick Stock:
1. Roasted Veggie stock (this is Liz's stock and it sounds amazing)
2. Dark stock (caramelize the onions before adding the celery and carrot or add about 1 Tbs. soy sauce at the end when tasting for saltiness).
3. Adding lentils, split peas, sprouted beans, bean broth, and brewer's yeast to the original stock will give it extra dimensions of deep dark earthiness...mmm.

Tomato Bisque

Another thing we've been getting a lot of in our CSA is tomatoes and I've also been wracking my brain to figure out what to do with them all. Sarah and I love creamy tomato soups but I've never had enough fresh tomatoes just lying around to try one out. So here goes...

Roasted Tomato Bisque

Ingredients:

A Bunch of tomatoes, skinned
(To skin tomatoes, score an X on the bottom side after having washed them, then dunk the tomatoes a few at a time into boiling water. Boil for about 15 seconds then scoop them out and dunk them in ice water. This will shock the skin right off the meat of the tomato, leaving you to peel it off like you would off a banana.)

Boiling water for 15 seconds.

Ice water for 15 seconds.

Then peel off the skin, leaving the meat.

6 garlic cloves, left unpeeled and uncrushed
Olive Oil
Salt and Pepper
1/2 tsp. dried oregano
1/4 tsp. ground cloves
1 medium onion, diced (here's a good way to dice an onion)
1 or 2 sticks celery
2 tsp. sugar
2 Tbs. butter
1 Tbs. flour
3 cups veggie stock
1/2 cup cream or milk
pinch baking soda

Start by halving the tomatoes and arranging them cut side up in a baking dish with the garlic. Drizzle all with olive oil and season with salt and pepper. Roast in a 350 degree oven for about 30 to 40 minutes or until the tops of the tomatoes begin to brown and the garlic is soft when you poke it. When done, remove the garlic from their husks and mash in a bowl or mortar.

Cook the onion in a large pot in the butter over very low heat for at least 10 minutes. More time on the stove will not hurt the onion and will add deeper flavor to the soup. When you feel that you've given the onion enough time, add the celery, oregano, and cloves. Sautee for 30 seconds or so. Then add 2 tsp. sugar and cook until it begins to caramelize.

Add in the roasted tomatoes, mashed garlic, and stock and simmer, covered, for about 20 minutes. Before adding the cream, add a pinch of baking soda to the soup to bring the pH closer to neutral. This will keep the acid of the tomato from curdling the cream when it is added to the soup with the flour.

So, after fizzing the soup, either run it through a food mill or blender it with a stick blender until smooth. Warm the cream over the stove for a minute or two. Remove from heat and wisk in the flour until completely encorporated. Add this mixture to the soup and bring it all back to a boil. Simmer, uncovered, another 5 minutes.

Serve with cheesy toast.

Vegetable Stock

So, its Tuesday night, I look in the fridge and all I see are vegetables about to go "bad". How am I going to possibly eat all those vegetables by myself? Then it dawns on me... now's my chance to finally make stock. About 2 hours later I have a rich, flavorful stock perfect for soups, stews or anything else requiring a stock. Here's how I did it:

Ingredients:
Any vegetables that you have. I used...
1 large onion
4 carrots
1 bunch of celery
1 red pepper
1 bunch of leeks
1 whole head of garlic
1 bunch of parsley
1 bunch of basil
1 small bunch thyme
small handful of peppercorns
1 bay leaf
12 cups water
1/2 cup white wine (optional)

Preheat your oven to 450 degrees and coarsely chop all your vegetables, removing the seeds from the peppers and peeling the garlic cloves, but not chopping them. Toss the vegetables with a little oil and roast them in a shallow baking pan for 45 minutes, turning them every 15 minutes.

In the meantime, remove the stems from the herbs and place them in the pot. I used two pots because I don't have one huge pot.

When the vegetables are done roasting (its okay if the edges are dark) put them into the pot (or pots) with the 12 cups of water, cover and bring to a boil.

Meanwhile, place the baking pan over two burners and heat over medium-high heat. Pour in the white wine and using a whisk, deglaze the pan. When all the alcohol has burned off and most of the delicious roasted vegetable bits have mixed in with the wine, pour it in with the water.

After the water has come to a boil, take the top off and simmer for 45 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Finally, strain the mixture using a large colander over a bowl. If you desire a thinner, clearer stock, strain again to remove the little bits of herbs and any vegetable pulp. For extra flavor, squeeze any juice from the vegetable mixture.

Now, how should I store all this stock, you ask. Simply pour into ice cube trays and freeze for use at a later date

Breakfast Quesedilla (aka B-Dillas)

Ingredients:
Tortillas (Tortillas)
Cheese (Queso)
Tomatoes (Tomates)
Avocado (Aguacate)
Onions (Ceballos)
Salsa (Salsa)
1 Egg per Dilla (Huevos)
Potatoes (Papas)

Hot pan + butter + tortilla + cheese

3 eggs w/o broken yokes, let the bottom bits cook first.

The break the yokes and stir a bit (but not as much as a scramble)

Fold the eggs into an omlette type thing. (Cut into 3 strips again 1 egg per dilla).

Splash the salsa, avo chunks, tomato chunks, salt and pepper

Fry up the potato chunks

Place all into the tortilla and fold in half, continue to cook in pan until it is mostly covered in brown flakey crispy golden goodness.

Enjoy!

Curry Lentil Vegetable Soup

This was a fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants recipe and it turned out well! I wasn't sure I would use all the ingredients I bought, but I went slowly and cautiously, tasting along the way, and now this soup and I are friends. The whole experience was made all the more fun by the Prince Pandora station!

Ingredients

1 1/2 c. red lentils
1 1/2 c. water
1 heaping teaspoon Garam Masala
1 handful chopped onion
1 can chicken broth (optional)
1/2 head broccoli
1 can diced tomato (or fresh)
1/2 zucchini diced
salt to taste
1 can coconut milk (optional)

Rinse lentils in colander until they stop gassing then rinse them in your pot until the water is clear. Add the 1 1/2 cups of water to cook the lentils in (I didn't measure it so just use what looks right to you - you can always add more) and the garam masala. Heat on medium fire.

This is what mine looked like after heating for a while... not too much stuff in there!

While the lentils and spice are cooking, chop up the onion. Add the onion when the lentils start to get soft, then chop up the rest of the veggies. After the lentils have been cooking for about 20-30 mins (most of the water will have been sucked up by the lentils), add the chicken broth, or another cup of water/veggie broth if you're not using the chicken broth. Next add the can of diced tomato and salt.

Bring this to a boil, then simmer, stirring to make sure the lentils haven't stuck to the bottom of the pan, then add the rest of the veggies.


Simmer this until the vegetables are cooked to your desired amount, check the salt and then you can be done!

If you're adding the coconut milk you can do it two ways - on top of each individual bowl

Or in the whole pot. It was pretty tasty!

china's comfort food

*EXCERPTED FROM THEJADETEASPOON

tomato•fried•egg

Tomato and egg join the familiar sweet and salty in an unlikely way, making this tasty comfort food a popular among locals and foreigners alike. The simplicity is surprisingly delicious.

In the campus canteen, the combo is often served over a bed of noodles or next to a bowl of rice.

tomato meets egg

THE RECIPE: TOMATO FRIED EGG

(1) tomato • (1) egg • oil • salt • sugar


THE METHOD: TOMATOES FIRST, EGGS LAST

1. 1 egg and 1 large tomato per serving
   
2. core and wedge tomatoes
   
3. add generous amount of oil* to wok
   
4. reduce the ripe tomatoes over medium-high flame
5. -meanwhile- add sugar and salt, for a balanced taste
   
6. beat eggs separately in a bowl
7. add pinch of salt to eggs
8. add water, approximately 1/3 quantity of eggs, beat
9. remove tomatoes from heat when saucy**
10. rinse pan and reuse for eggs
11. preheat liberal amounts of oil
    
12. scramble eggs in oil (have lid handy)
    
13. add tomatoes back into wok and reheat briefly
14. serve over noodles or rice

NOTES:

*Do no use extra virgin olive oil, aka evoo. In fact, I recommend not using any oil with recognizable flavor - a plain vegetable oil is perfect. The tomatoes and egg, coupled with sugar and salt provide plenty of flavor. I found a flavorful oil, such as evoo complicated the overall taste in a way that ruined the simplicity and made it an entirely different dish.

**If you only have sad, pink tomatoes at hand, the addition of plain tomato sauce (or paste) compensate nicely for the missing flavor and flavonoids alike.

*** While it is tempting for most cooks to add garlic at the oil-preheating stage, here too, I found that garlic complicated the flavor in an undesirable. Which is to say... it is simply another dish.

Feel free to adjust the ratio of egg:tomato as your palette calls to you.

The recipe above yield a pure, simple version tomato•fried•egg:

classic comfort food

fried•rice

Fried rice might be just leftover rice, but it is a second chance for steamed rice to remake itself in yet another wholesome way.

spicy Anaheim accents fresh eggs

THE RECIPE: FRIED•RICE

leftover•steamed•rice
scrambled•eggs
diced•Anaheim•pepper
vegetable•oil
thick•sweet•soy•sauce
pinch•o•salt


THE METHOD: MUSTGO*

1. preheat oil in wok over high flame
   
2. toss leftover rice in wok
3. break up an rice clumps
4. add soy sauce and toss evenly
5. add chopped vegetables and retoss
   
6. salt to taste
   
7. serve!
   

Every grain of rice ought to have a chance to bask in the heat of the oil, continuously tossing for an added depth.

Fried rice dictates very few rules, other than everything must be rice-size or comparably diced. As rice is the dominating component, any competition from the décor renders the rice an invader and the dish weak.

simply fried rice

Here in Beijing, it is quite common to find corn, ham, bell or Anaheim peppers, and the occasional carrot, all finely diced. And of course, fried rice is not fried rice without the scrambled egg.

Roasted Beets and Onions with Steamed Broccoli

I have another simple yet delicious couple of dishes that come in handy when you only have a little time and one or two people to feed.

Ingredients

3 medium sized beets
2 medium onions
2 T. (ish) braggs
salt and pepper to taste
1/4 c. olive oil

1 head broccoli


Chop the beets into bite sized pieces and dice the onion. Mix them together in a small baking dish (I used a bread pan). Squirt some Braggs in there, salt and pepper, mix thoroughly. Add olive oil and mix again, making sure that everything is evenly coated with the oil

I turned the oven to 375 (I didn't preheat), covered the pan with aluminum foil and baked it for about 45 minutes. I then took it out, mixed the veggies, tasted one and then cooked for another 30 mins uncovered.

perfect

I then cut up the broccoli and steamed it and ate them together. This made 2 meals for me and was pretty darn tasty!

Monkey dal?

Ahoy hoy! Inspired by Sarah and Jeff's naan adventures... this is a dal recipe we've done a few times, along with a recipe from Vegetarian cooking for everyone... that I can't remember right now... even though I just cooked it and ate it tonight. It's an indian-ish dish, with potato, cauliflower, spinach, and watercress. I'll find it some other time. With the dish I can't remember, this dal recipe, some rice, and naan, you've got a feast for 4.

Sautee paper thin slices of one large onion in 2-3 tbsp ghee (mmmmm!) until they're golden. Once the onions have started, bring 2 cups of water to a boil in a heavy saucepan, and add 1 cup mung ki dal (small yellow lentils, or a similar sized lentil--french green work fine, too) plus 1 tsp salt, 1 tsp turmeric, and 1/4 tsp ground red chile. Simmer over low heat, partly covered, for about 30 minutes. When it's done add the onions, simmer until everything's hot, and taste for spices. Yummmmmm!

apple pie

Craving apple pie? My recipe ended up a bit long-winded, so here is a link to it instead...

apple pie in a tart pan

Beet Amuse Bushe with Tomatoes Provencal

So we've been getting weekly veggies from our local CSA and lately have been getting lots and lots of beets. Beets are one of those plants that are available year round here in Santa Cruz, so I'm afraid that we are going to be getting beets every week from now on...ugh! It's not that I don't like beets, they're just something that showed up on holidays at my grandparents house once or twice a year. We'd eat them, and like them, but not see them again until the year after. Now I've got beets coming out of my ears! Here's something we whipped together to use up our inventory.

Ingredients:

Butter
2 small mashing Potatoes
1 Tbs. blue cheese
1 Apple
Tomatoes
3/4 cup Bread Crumbs
3 cloves Garlic
3 Tbs. chopped Fresh Basil
Olive Oil
1 Beet
Salt and Pepper


Start in by preheating the oven to 400F. Then continue by peeling, coring, and slicing the apple. Peel and Cube the potatoes. Cook each in boiling water until tender.


Drain the apples and make applesauce (plain or sweetened, your choice). Of course, we just need a little bit of apple sauce for this recipe but if you have bucket loads of apples, make bucket loads of applesauce. If you're really intrepid you can then take some of this and cook it down over really really low heat for several hours (double boiler? Crock pot?), which will caramelize the sugars in the applesauce and leave you with apple butter...yum.

For this recipe heat 1 Tbs. butter in a frying pan, spoon in about 3 Tbs. of the applesauce and cook it all for about 30 seconds. This will approximate apple butter for us here real quick. No waiting.

Peel and slice the beet into rings. Beware of beet hands!! Not as bad or as bad looking as biscuit hands, but still. Boil the beet in water until tender.


Slice the tomatoes in half and gently scoop out the seeds and liquids. Set these in a largish baking dish.


Here Sarah has mixed together the garlic, basil, breadcrumbs, and a little bit of the tomato juice to hold it all together. She then added salt and pepper to taste. Having mixed all this together, she then spoons it into the tomatoes, heaping a bit.

Drizzle a little bit of olive oil over all and shove the whole mess into the oven. Roast until the bread crumbs start to brown a little bit.

In the mean time I've drained the potatoes and have added some pepper, butter, and blue cheese before mashing it all with a stick blender (I've probably said it before, but this invention is amazing!).

Spoon the mashed potato onto a tin-foiled baking sheet. Smooth out the peaks so they don't burn in the oven.

After baking for about 15 minutes or so. I can't remember so you'll have to check on it every once in a while.  Lay down a small bed of lettuce. Place a single boiled beet slice on afore said bed. Spoon up one of the potato pods and place this on top of the stack. Top it off with a small amount of apple butter. The bigger the plate, the more you could charge for it in a fancy restaurant.

We put the tomato on a bed of eggy rice and drizzled a little more olive oil over all. It was great.

Eggy Rice:
1 cup white rice
1 egg, beaten
salt and pepper to taste
Steam the rice. When done stir in the beaten egg. The heat of the rice should cook the egg. Add salt and pepper to taste.