One of the things I really like about working downtown is the Wednesday Farmer’s Market in the Park blocks. This week, I hiked up there with the intention of finding ingredients for a pizza, as I had just come across a dough recipe in Fine Cooking that I wanted to try out.

My trip was a complete success as I scored some fresh green garlic, a big spring onion, local Mozzarella, tomatoes on the vine and some spinach. And I’m happy to report this dough experiment was also a complete success and I am becoming less and less afraid of yeast bread making. Hooray!

Easy Pizza Dough
From Fine Cooking magazine
1 package (2-1/4 tsp.) active-dry yeast
1-1/2 cups very warm water (100-110°F)
18 oz. (4 cups) all-purpose flour; more for dusting
1-1/2 tsp. salt
2 Tbs. olive oil

First, dissolve the yeast in the warm water and set aside for a few minutes (5-10). Then, put the flour and salt in a food processor fitted with the steel blade; process briefly to mix. With the machine running, add the water-yeast mixture in a steady stream. Turn the processor off and add the oil. Pulse a few times to mix in the oil.

Now, I did this in my small-sized food processor and it just fit. If you don’t have a processor, I don’t see why you couldn’t just use your hands or a spatula to mix it and get it into a dough state. But, again, I used my processor, so I could be assuming too much about the hand/spatula thing. Maybe a stand mixer with a dough hook?

Scrape the dough onto a lightly floured surface. With lightly floured hands, quickly knead the dough into a mass, incorporating any bits of flour or dough from the processor bowl that weren’t mixed in. Cut the dough into four equal pieces with a knife or a dough scraper. Roll each piece into a tight, smooth ball, kneading to push the air out. Here, mine were not perfectly smooth but they seemed to be smooth enough, as it worked fine.

Freezing:
If you want to save all or some of the dough, at this point, take the dough you want to freeze and lightly dust it with flour and pop each one into a freezer bag. The recipe says it will keep in the freezer for about a month. To defrost, put it in the fridge about 8-10 hours before you want to use it. Then, let it sit at room temperature for about 15 minutes before shaping the crust. I haven’t defrosted mine yet, but when I do, I’ll give a recap as to how the frozen dough worked.

Using right away
To rise the dough right away (without freezing), put the dough balls on a lightly floured surface, cover them with a clean dishtowel, and let them rise until they almost double in size, about 45 minutes. Preheat the oven to 500 degrees (make sure your oven is clean or it may smoke). If your oven can’t quite make it to 500 without complaining (smoking, shaking, etc…) try for 475-480 degrees.

Shaping the pizza
Put the ball of dough on a lightly floured wooden board. Sprinkle a little more flour on top of the ball. Using your fingertips, press the ball down into a flat cake about 1/2 inch thick.

Flour your fingers — and the board — for easier handling. Stretch the dough to a thickness of about 1/4 inch by using the backs of your hands or a rolling pin. Transfer dough to your lightly oiled baking sheet (or use a pizza peel then transfer to a baking stone in the oven after topping).

Garlic, onion and spinach sauteeing away.

Top the pizza
Well, just scatter the ingredients around to within 1/2 inch of the border. I brushed the surface all over with garlic olive oil, then used fresh basil leaves and then the sauteed spinach, green garlic, spring onion; tomato slices, mozzarella and little dollops of nicoise olive spread. Oh and a quick sprinkle of dried thyme.

Everything was from the Farmer’s Market except for the olive oil, basil and olive spread — not too bad!

Bake for 8-10 minutes at 500 degrees until the top gets golden and the crust puffs up a bit around the edges and turns a delicious, toasted color.

I made two small pizzas and froze the other two balls of dough, so there will be more pizza in the near future. Maybe we will start a Wednesday Night Farmer’s Market Pizza tradition…

Spinach Gratin on the holiday table

Looking for something to do with a gallon of whole milk? Well, today’s a two-fer. Sure, the holidays are over and so is the time for cream and non-non-fat milk, but if you do choose to splurge anytime soon, here are two really good recipes to make and enjoy. Add a roast chicken to the mix and you have a whole cold weather meal.

The Spinach Gratin is from Ina Garten and the rice pudding is from Giada Delaurentis aka: Little Big Head.

Spinach Gratin
(works well halved)
4 tablespoons (1/2 stick) unsalted butter
4 cups chopped yellow onions (2 large)
1/4 cup flour
1/4 teaspoon grated nutmeg
1 cup heavy cream
2 cups milk
3 pounds frozen chopped spinach, defrosted
1 package button mushrooms, sliced (10-12 mushrooms)
1 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese
1 tablespoon kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1/2 cup grated Gruyere cheese

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F. Melt the butter in a heavy-bottomed saute pan over medium heat. Add the onions and mushrooms, saute until soft, about 15 minutes. Add the flour and nutmeg and cook, stirring, for 2 more minutes. Add the cream and milk and cook until thickened. Squeeze as much liquid as possible from the spinach and add the spinach to the sauce. Add 1/2 cup of the Parmesan cheese and mix well. Season, to taste, with salt and pepper.

Transfer the spinach to a baking dish and sprinkle the remaining 1/2 cup Parmesan and the Gruyere on top. Bake for 20 minutes until hot and bubbly. Serve hot. Leftovers? Use it to make a decadent spinach lasagna by alternating noodles, red sauce and your spinach mixture. Top with extra red sauce and mozzarella.

Next, this is an awesome dessert. The orange/vanilla combo gives it a really great dreamsicle quality. If you don’t have dark rum, you can use some grand mariner. The risotto rice makes it extra creamy.

Vanilla-Orange Rice Pudding
5 cups whole milk
2/3 cup Arborio rice or other short-grain white rice
1 vanilla bean, split lengthwise
1/2 cup sugar
2 teaspoons dark rum or Grand Marnier liqueur
1 teaspoon grated orange peel

Combine the milk and rice in a heavy medium saucepan. Scrape in the seeds from the vanilla bean; add the bean. Bring the milk to a boil. Reduce the heat to medium and simmer until the rice is tender, stirring frequently, about 25 minutes. Mix in the sugar, alcohol, and orange peel. Discard the vanilla bean. Cook until the mixture thickens, 5 to 10 minutes longer.

Spoon the rice pudding into bowls. Serve warm or cover and refrigerate until cold, about 5 hours.

Snow!
Whoo! It’s snowing in Portland! We have about 2 inches so far and we’re supposed to have snow until 4pm today. How high will the accumulation be then? I made it into work (took 60 minutes instead of 30 on the Hawthorne bus). But, will I make it home tonight? Perhaps I will be walking. We’ll see. When I get home, I’ll have some snow photos of downtown and the SE!

The Traveler’s Lunchbox recently started a listing of Five Things to Eat Before You Die that has been working its way around the food blogs. Christine over at the aptly named, Christine Cooks, tagged me over the weekend. I took a few days to think it over and here’s what I managed to come up with (in no particular order).

1. Something That You’ve Grown Yourself
You don’t need a yard to grow tomatoes — a big pot on a sunny balcony will work. Or try a window sill herb garden. Or maybe a bell pepper plant or sweet corn out in your backyard. The point is to grow something (from seed or small plant), nourish it, take care of it and then eat it all up. We have a whole bunch of Roma tomatoes that we are harvesting right now that are great on sandwiches, excellent in salsa and will probably make it into a batch of tomato sauce to be frozen and thawed out on an upcoming Fall night.

2. A Meal at Pacific Way Cafe, Gearhart, OR
Oh, we love the Pacific Way Cafe. The bread. The creamy Gorgonzola dressing. The soups. The homemade malted chocolate ice cream. Oh, I could go on forever about the creamy Gorgonzola dressing — did I mention that? In the US, head west until you can’t go any farther. Turn right or left depending where you are and get yourself to Gearhart, OR. Have a great meal and then take a stroll along the beach. It doesn’t get much better than this.

3. A Roast Chicken Dinner
Nothing says comfort food like a succulent roast chicken with crackling, golden skin and chicken-juice soaked potatoes and other assorted root vegetables. Everyone should make a roast chicken at least once during their lifetime, even if it’s just a plain ‘ole chicken, some olive oil, salt and pepper and a potato or two.

4. The PokPok/Pix Combo: A Roasted Game Hen from PokPok, followed by a Rosemary Pear Tart from Pix Patisserie, SE Division St, Portland, OR
Oh, this is an amazing thing. You walk down Division street and get yourself a moist, juicy, crispy-skinned Thai game hen (Kai Yaang — stuffed with garlic and lemon grass) to eat outside at one of the small take-out tables, then you walk two more blocks and pick yourself out a French pastry. This is just … I don’t even know. Gastronomic heaven? A culinary around-the-world dream come true? A cheap and tasty dinner date? Pear rosemary is still my favorite but Shazam! is running a close second.

5. Seared Ahi Tuna (Rare)
I can’t believe I never even tried seared tuna until I was 28! Yeah, I said 28. That’s just crazy. I don’t know, I didn’t think rare/mostly raw fish would be good. Now, seared tuna (really rare) is one of my most favorite meals ever. It just goes to show you, you should always try a new food. If you don’t like it, you don’t have to eat it. And it might turn out to be your new favorite meal. So, I guess you could also say that one of the five things you should eat before you die is something new — something that is maybe a bit out of your comfort zone.

As for tagging new people, I’ll just say that if you haven’t done this yet and you have a food blog, consider yourself tagged!