Tart tart

The last of the king trumpet mushrooms, smeared with a basil pesto. I'm feeling the effects of pizza fatigue.

And one more roasted vegetable pizza. This is getting predictable now. But I must say, the pizza doughs lately have been very well behaved and great to work with.

This cranberry polenta tart was filled with a custard of leftover Thanksgiving cranberry sauce. Nothing really wrong with this cranberry tart, I'm sure lots of people would love it. But for me, meh. So as of today, I officially declare my dislike of cranberries. Bah! Cranberries. But ridged cranberry tube from a can is still on the good list.

Happy tree friends

My Baby Trees of the National Parks are doing well enough to move into larger pots. We did lose the coast redwood sapling over the hot dry summer. We will have a moment of silence, mourn, and then send the dried out redwood carcass into the wood chipper.

Super deformed lemon. The limoncello tree is so silly sometimes. It's been super happy this year. So glad I didn't send it through the wood chipper years ago.

And once again, I call upon the services of pizza to help deal with meat cake party leftovers. The salame was once part of the antipasto plate and the cheeses from meat cake.

Leftover mushrooms from mushroom cake.

And leftover roasted vegetables from veggie cake and beef cake. Still, not much of a noticeable dent in the refrigerator. I might be eating leftovers for the rest of the month. Aie-ya!

Me-zah

Focacias and pizzas, how I love thee...

I love you so much, I always make three.

The only thing better, would be pizza for free.

Tasty and pretty, I eat them with glee.

Especially because they're are all for me.

Pear, gruyere and gorgonzola dessert pizza. No bacon.

Kitty surprise

In honor of Hello Kitty's 34th birthday, I make beet and walnut dip. Like hummus, but with beets instead of chickpeas. This should make a good sammich spread too. Hello Kitty won't be able to eat this because Hello Kitty has no mouth.

Pretty pink pizza dough results from being too lazy to wash the food processor bowl after making beet dip. Hello Kitty serendipity has gotten me thinking about making a baguette that's pink inside. How awesome would that be? Now that we have pizza dough, we're ready for tonight's pizza flight.

Vegetarian surprise pizza. It only appears to be a gorgeous late summer vegetable pizza. But one bite into it... SURPRISE! A hidden layer of prosciutto! Surprise bacon! Your eyes say it will be delicious, but your tongue tells you it's even more delicious than you first thought. Surprise Bacon!

This one is made with mushroom paste, caramelized onions, artichokes, pecorino and gruyere. Home made pizza crust is so incredibly crispy chewy delicious that I stretched the dough out so each piece has two crusts. This is the most incredible crust I've ever made. I tweaked the dough recipe with rye flour for a more substantial flavor. And of course, I made it pink.

Seriously, this is the bestest most super number one pizza I've ever tasted in the 34 years of Hello Kitty's existence. Perfect thin crispy chewy crust, fresh ripe heirloom tomatoes, pancetta, mozzarella, fontina, and parmesan cheeses. Even tastier than the coal baked pizza I had wandering around the canals of Venice. This is now the new gold standard. The secret is a drizzle of olive oil. Olive oil with a surprise anchovy whisked in.

 

Imaginate

I'm starting to recycle the old standbys to use up all those tomatoes. I should be more inventive.

The rule around this house is that the uglier the pizza, the more diliciouser.

Butterflies in my stomach

I filtered out all the fat and solids from bacon infused vodka. When I get my courage up, there will be bacon bloody mary's. Scared. Very very scared.

Once again it's Pesto Festo time. Tonight we make three different kinds- pine nut basil, walnut arugula, and pumpkin seed cilantro. Always good to have pestos around the house as a sauce for pasta, or sandwich spread, or stirred into a soup, or a marinade for seafood, or floor wax and glass cleaner. I am not sure I labeled all the identical looking pestos correctly, so I may be putting together some ill-conceived flavor combinations in the future.

Height of tomato season is upon us. We will be eating a lot of caprese salads over the next month.

This batch of pizza dough is especially perky and eager. It didn't get the memo about me being a failure at yeast things. Sssshhh... nobody tell.

Spinach and sausage farfalle. They don't really look like butterflies to me. There must have been a lot of vino when they invented farfalle.

Purple people eater

Cool beans! How awesome are purple beans? I know I say that every time I harvest purple beans. But they are AWESOME! And favas too. But fava beans aren't as awesome because they aren't purple.

Mushroom confit and bacon pizzas. Super thin crust this time. 

And classic margarita style pizza. Culinarily, I should probably move away from pizzas in my repertoire and try new things. But pizzas are such a quick and easy standby for mindless school night fare. Faster than you can answer the door for Domino's, I can put a few pizza pies on the table. But creatively, I should try to master other dishes.

Mushroom tops

Mushroom pizza. The mushroom topping was slowly cooked in butter until delicious.

Baker's dozen eggs

My new favorite way of preparing eggs. Plunk eggs into a 185 degree oven for about an hour. Foolproof perfectly gooey eggs. And my own bread to sop up all the eggy-ness.

And for lunch, my version of bacon sammiches that Meredith and Bruce made when I visited the other day. My raddichio was braised in chicken broth.

And the beginnings of both a lemon meringue pie and a key lime pie. Pie! Pie!



And banana bread and what will be a chocolate hazelnut mascarpone cheesecake.

And the kitchen madness doesn't stop there. Josh and the Flip are coming over for game night. So we have pesto pizza.

And salame pizza. It's been a busy cooking day.

And garlic and herb pizza. And we're still not done cooking.

And proscuitto pizza. The wiimotes may need a bit of de-greasing by the end of the night.

Black marks

Technically not pizza. Ham, gruyere, and caramelized onion tart. I'd like to say this Alsatian concoction was inspired by a particularly memorable meal I had in Paris a couple winters ago, but the truth is that I copied the ingredients off the back of a Trader Joe's frozen entree.



The torrential rains make ants seek shelter in my kitchen. I wish we have a pair of anteaters in the menagerie of animals within borrowing distance. With all the rains, and various livestock milling about, I've got an urge to build an arc.



Honey bear squeezy bottle is now panda bear squeezy bottle.

Feeding livestock

Finally a beautiful clear day after the cold rainy days. Perfect excuse for a stroll around the neighborhood. We have snow in them thar hills!



The neighborhood sheep like to sit on benches. There have been sightings of mountain lions in the neighborhood recently. So raising sheep in your front yard may just be setting out food for the giant kitties.



Preston like-y them sheep. Am I violating some kosher laws by feeding a sheep dog lamb and rice based kibble?



Must... stop... making... pizzas...

Buttered up

I made my own butter from cream and flavored it with a smidge of basil. Because I can.



And a killer carrot ginger honey chile sauce.



Beginnings of one batch pizza dough. And the beginnings of another bread failure. Based upon my bread baking history, I'm setting my expectations low.



Delicious garlic bread with Davy butter. And a refreshing shaved fennel and meyer lemon salad. It's like Fresca with a fork.

Re-peatza

Pizza shows up in the repertoire too often. We must try to fix that. But oh, how I love the entire cheese food group.

Black and white

Nope. It's still cold in Iowa today.



The floor follows the Dr. Suess-ian school of design.



Pizza night. I made a lot. I lost count after 7. Tonight's secret ingredients are sunchokes and hen of the woods mushrooms.



Preston cookie. Smells nicer than the real one.