This Is A Pizza

Before Panicky moved to Ohio, she worked in food PR, which means I got a lot of free cookbooks. One, This is a Cookbook, has found its way into a permanent spot on the kitchen shelf, mostly because of pizza. Max and Eli Sussman, one of whom worked at the great Bushwick restaurant Roberta's, inspired me to finally, finally make pizza at home, and it turns out that it's really easy. Mindlessly easy. Pizza has become a fallback dinner, when we don't have enough of anything else in the house except flour (like, one time we used Polly-O string cheese as a topping). Last night's version, with an improved topping of fresh ricotta, was subpar - the crust never got crispy - yet, was still quite good. Try it, people, do not be like me and assume homemade pizza is hard!

Slick of tomato sauce + turkey sausage + ricotta + kale + spicy honey = too many toppings = vaguely cooked crust

(Alternatively, the pizza place down the street has never disappointed, except when briefly closed by the Department of Health).

Pizza Dough
Combine a cup of warm water, a teaspoon of sugar, and a packet of instant yeast in a mixing bowl. Let sit for 5 minutes. Add 3 cups of flour and a tablespoon of salt. Attach the dough hook to your stand mixer and let it run on medium-low for ten minutes. No stand mixer? Order delivery, sorry. I mean, knead it by hand until it feels like dough, about ten minutes (I'd order delivery). Cover the bowl with plastic wrap or a damp towel and let sit out for two hours (it can rise in 30 minutes if your apartment is particularly warm, but two hours does the trick for me), or, if you thought ahead, for 8-24 hours in the fridge.

The Pizza Itself
Preheat the oven to 450. Oil a baking sheet and stretch about half the dough (I freeze the rest; it defrosts in 30 seconds in the microwave) over it. Get it nice and thin. Top with the dregs of a jar of sauce, cheese, bits of meat and veg, whatever you have lying around. Pop it in the oven for ten minutes - more if needed - and you're done. That's it! That's really it!

A Post That Was Going To Be About Ginger Tea But Instead Turned Into A Weird Navel-Gazing Ramble About My Cookbooks

I tend to dive into cookbooks, proclaim their life-changing values to anyone who'll listen, and then move on, leaving a trail of specially purchased pantry items in my wake. See: Harumi's Japanese Cooking (packets of kombu seaweed and dried bonito flakes), Super Natural Every Day (garbanzo flour), that dan dan mein phase (a one-pound bag of Sichuan peppercorns that I should have returned as they have no flavor), Momofuku Milk (milk powder, gelatin packets, citric acid, pistachio paste, Ovaltine, strips of clear acetate, a six-inch cake ring... thank God I didn't buy the bucket of recommend glucose syrup). When I fall for a cookbook, I fall hard, and then, just as suddenly, I'm be done. I'm one of those caddish serial monogamists that cookbooks' mothers warn them to stay away from.

I don't regret any of this, though, because even if I only take away one "yup, I'll make this forever" recipe from a book, that recipe will make mine and Dan's lives better until we die. I.e. the only thing I currently use Harumi's book for is the miso soup with sesame paste, but that soup is so rich and satisfying that it's worth the purchase. I made the pistachio cake from Milk for Mom and Scott's 25th anniversary, and it was outstanding - but it would have been way too intimidating to make on a whim if I hadn't made like 12 other recipes from that insanely complicated cookbook last year (and I wouldn't have known that it's ok to cut out about 1/3 of the steps).

Anyway, I started the phase-out process with It's All Good last month, moving it from the counter - where only one book lives at a time - to the kitchen rack, which houses 5 or 6. It displaced Sydney Food*, which moved to the living room, joining fellow exiles The Perfect Scoop, How to Cook Everything, I Like You**, The Essential New York Times Cookbook, and like 15 other books I haven't cracked in a year. But then I got sick, so I consulted dear Gwyneth's book again, and now it's back on the counter because of her ginger tea.

It's nothing revolutionary: grated ginger plus honey and lemon, steeped in water. But it's been one of the few things to help with my nice end-of-summer grossness. I brew it in a French-press-your-coffee-on-the-go traveler and keep it in the fridge. Sometimes it's the little things that keep you current.

-------------------------------

*I love, love, love Sydney Food, by Bill Granger. It's one of the first cookbooks I ever bought, back in 2003, because I loved the food at Bills restaurant in Sydney so much. The coconut bread and ricotta hotcakes are happiness in a mixing bowl.

Li'l Smoky via

**Conversely, I wasn't crazy about Amy Sedaris's I Like You. It has a granny aesthetic that makes its pages smell of phantom mustiness. However, I made its Li'l Smoky Cheese Ball for our Christmas party, and it was a MASSIVE, GARGANTUAN hit. Live it, learn it, and never make another hors d'oeuvres for your party again.

2 cups shredded smoked Gouda cheese, room temperature
2 packages (8 ounces each) cream cheese, room temperature
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature
2 tablespoons milk
2 teaspoons steak sauce
1 cup toasted chopped walnuts or pecans
Ritz crackers, for serving

Place Gouda, cream cheese, butter, milk and steak sauce in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a paddle attachment and mix until well combined. Transfer mixture to refrigerator and let chill overnight. Roll cheese mixture into a ball. Place nuts in a shallow dish. Roll cheese in nuts to fully coat. Serve with Ritz crackers (NO SUBSTITUTIONS).