Crummy pizza and good wine – 23 January 2012

What was wrong with this? I think perhaps it just didn’t cook right in the smaller oven. Looked good, though.

This was a quickie personal pizza of the Brussels sprouts and pancetta persuasion. The dough was made yesterday and stuck in a plastic container in the fridge, rather than frozen. First off, it kicked off its stuck-on lid twice – once overnight, and again during the day today. I put olive oil over the dough this morning to reverse the drying-out it had done overnight, and that worked ok, even though it tossed off the top again. Second, the Brussels sprouts didn’t cook well. Some edges burnt and the unburnt parts were pretty well raw. Not going to kill anyone, but less than optimal. Third, instead of tossing on uncooked pancetta pieces, I pre-cooked them. Given the sprouts did not cook, this mistake was probably fortunate. I underlaid the cheese with two teensy garlic clovelets, minced, instead of garlic oil. No idea if that had much effect. The cheese was the relatively flavorless fresh mozz from the Bowl; I forgot to salt it, and also it was a major impediment to heat reaching the crust, which didn’t cook optimally – even though it was on a small stone. Well, come to think of it, it was on cornmeal on the stone, so perhaps that made a big difference. I grated Pecorino Romano over the top before serving – what could go wrong with that? 😉

The leftover 1/3 bottle of Ventoux, of course, was great.

{Written the 23rd; pictures added and posted the 29th}

~ by berkeleybarb on 2012/01/23.