Pizza Friday

I am not here to tell you that pizza is the greatest food ever. That would be silly. It might, however, give the greatest ROI of just about anything you can cook at home.

Plenty of other sources will tell you their secrets and give you tips on how to do it. As for me, it's been a combination of trial and error, copying other people's work, and relying on one of my core kitchen references, The New Basics. If you want to know how upper-middle-class white America (primarily east of the Mississippi) ate at the end of the 20th century, that is the source. 

In seriousness, the book lives up to its title, and like most of the recipes, the pizza dough is simple and lacking in embellishment, allowing you to make pretty much any adjustment you can think of as you begin experimenting with pies on your own. In fact, I would go so far as to say that the Ladies (as my old roommate Rico and I used to call them) were the first to impress on me the idea that cooking was the synthesis of a handful of very simple recipes and techniques, elemental on their own but delicious and even profound when worked together with inspiration and talent. It's the equivalent of David Baker's jazz improvisation method....but I digress.

Normally, BoW is the one that makes pie, but since I ain't working, I got no excuse. That said, I did get her to form the second pie. Generally, when a baking recipe that produces two of anything, it produces one that is formed easily and nearly perfectly and one that makes me very angry. It's never always one or the other that's good, adding to the Russian Roulette aspect of the baking process.

The part that I'm good at is topping. Of course, there's not much to it––or there shouldn't be, anyway. I find that we have the best success when limiting to cheese plus 2-3 toppings. I also generally eschew tomato sauce and rely on a very thin layer of tomato paste or just olive oil and some seasoning. The key is to get really nice toppings.

Here, fine ham abounds.

Both pies were treated to this fresh burrata, gotten from the market when I got asparagus.

The first pie (sautéed portobello, roasted red pepper, and olives) went in fully dressed and came out GBD, just the way you'd expect.

The second pie (domestic prosciutto, burrata, and arugula) went in like a focaccia with just oil, seasoning and some parmesan to bake until crisp. The toppings didn't go on until it came out, just wilting under the heat from the crust.

After what ended up being a long day for BoW, it was quite a successful meal and provided leftovers for future lunching. And after making the 'za from scratch, you can feel good about purchasing a little dessert.