Well, this definitely was not a regular Friday pizza and movie night.
First of all, the kids wanted to watch the new National Treasure 2 movie, which we actually watched on Tuesday (!), right when the movie was released. They hadn’t seen it in the theater, because Sabrina has issues with movie theaters – she doesn’t like the dark and the loudness of the surround sound. Bummer for me, because at home there are too many distractions – i.e. the dogs, phones, and Alexander talking.
Second, in our quest for the most perfect pizza, we determined that our pizza oven just wasn’t cooking the crust the way we like it. And in all the research we have done, the only way to achieve that crispy crust is with an oven temp of 650 degrees and above. Well, we don’t own an oven that goes that high – are there any out there that do?
Enter the barbecue. Last time we checked, that baby goes up to 750 degrees. Woohoo!! I’ll spare you the details, but suffice to say thanks to amazon.com, we bought a Villaware barbecue pizza stone for $63.00, with super saver shipping. The regular price for the stone is, wait for it……..$100.00 from Williams Sonoma. Bonus!!
So tonight, we put the stone on the cue, fired it up and made our pizzas. Here’s the first picture of the stone on the grill. Now remember, this is after we’ve used it….that’s why it looks all splotchy….
This next picture is to show you how nice the stone looks on the grill. This is David’s domain. No one is allowed to touch it. He loves his barbecue! It’s okay, because I don’t let him touch my Cuisinart Mixer. My dad gave him this barbecue on the condition that David cook a steak for him (my dad) at least once a month. David upped the deal and told my dad that he would cook anything, anytime my dad wanted. Sausages, chicken, steak, shrimp, vegetables – you name it, it’s been cooked out here. Now we can add pizza to the ever expanding list.
So the finale to the pizza story here here is that the pizzas were soooo good, and soooo crispy, they never made it to the dinner table. We ate them, running back and forth to the grill as we cooked the rest of them. The last time I had pizza this good was in a restaurant. Actually, I take that back. This was better. And here is the last pizza we made, the only one left (I made four!).
So how did I top off this amazing dinner? Glad you asked. Because I went on a biscotti baking blitz today. The weather has been so strange. On Monday, the temperature was 106. Today, rainy and 57. Oookkkaaayyyy. So it was perfect weather to bake biscotti. I had a Lemon Semolina Cookie recipe from Gina DePalma (the Babbo pastry chef) that I wanted to try, plus I made Orange Biscotti and Chocolate Espresso Bean Biscotti from Dorie Greenspans book. Yes, I know, I feel like I’m cheating on the group but there was a shortage of biscotti around here so it was necessary to replenish the supplies in order to avoid a mutiny.
The Lemon Semolina tasted just like a soft biscotti. The lemon flavor didn’t stand out enough so I think next time I’ll use more lemon zest, and double the amount of limoncello. The orange biscotti were really good. They had a good, strong orange flavor. And for the chocolate biscotti, I used chocolate-covered espresso beans instead of plain chocolate chips.
So as you can tell, I had a really successful day. Tomorrow, the kids are cooking, so I may not be as productive. But I’ll let you know so you can check out what they’ve done!!
