Fast, wilted, and involving goat cheese

Ever since my friend shared a link to this Salon.com article on local pizza joints, I've been jonesing for my favorite Wichita pizza place, Knolla's.

To paraphrase, Anastacia Marx de Salcedo writes that since over 70% of pizza places in America are still locally owned, ordering large pie with extra anchovies is a tasty, effective way to stimulate the economy. De Salcedo argues that a pillar of indie pizza's success is the dough; no matter how hard pizza giants try to automate the process, customers still prefer dough that's made by hand. She says that if Americans were to double their annual pizza intake, the industry's spending on goods, services and wages would reach $172 billion.

Which brings me back to Knolla's. The workers make Knolla's dough by hand, using secrets the company's owners picked up from Sicilian pizza-makers in New York. They use whole-milk cheese, fresh spices, and The Tomato Sauce of the Gods. Put a slice of their Chicago-style cheese pizza in my hands and I'm a happy girl. My husband and I love Knolla's so much, that even though we live out of delivery range for every location, we're willing to drive to pick up our pizza. That's a big statement, considering we used to live within walking distance of five other pizza parlors.

However, as much as I would love to bring the economy back up to snuff, I can't eat Knolla's every day, every week of my life. My bank account and my waistline depend on restraint in this department. Vegetables must take precedence over Knolla's most of the time, but I still. Want. Pizza. most every day.

That's when I make the thin-crusted, veggie-laden wonder, the OMFG Pizza. It's full of ruffly chard, carmelly onions, roasty garlic, and salty goat cheese. It's easy on the eyes and the hips. Plus, the crunchy crust requires no making, no tossing, and comes in packs of 10 if you buy Mama Lupe's tortillas, made in beautiful Mound Ridge, Ks.

So, until I make it to Knolla's again, I'll be throwing this pizza together during the work week.

It's crispy, it's delicate, and it wards off vampires.

The quick-and-dirty, thin-crust pizza
also known as "The OMFG Pizza"

• 1 whole wheat tortilla, medium
• 1/4 cup marinara sauce* (I used vodka cream sauce)
  
• 1 tsp. olive oil
  
• 1 oz goat mozzarella
  
• 6 Greek olives, assorted and cut into thin slices
• three garlic cloves, cut into large chunks
• two or three green onions, sliced thinly
  
• 1 large leaf of chard, sliced into 1/2 inch strips.
  
• 1/4 tsp. each oregano and caraway
• 1 tsp. capers, if you like
  

Preheat your oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit, then heat olive oil in a pan over medium heat. Saute the onion while you chop chard and garlic. Add garlic and saute for another minute while you lay the tortilla on a baking sheet. Smear the tortilla with marinara sauce to a 1/2 inch from the edges.

Toss chard on top of the onion and garlic, add a splash of water to the pan, and stir the veggies with a large spoon until the chard is lightly wilted. Don't overcook the chard, and remove the pan from heat as soon as it's begun to "soften" in texture.

Layer sauteed veggies and olives on the tortilla, then top with shredded mozzarella, oregano, and caraway. Toast that baby for 10 minutes and voila! C'est bien!

Citrus envy

This week, our fair city was blessed with spring-like weather. Birds chirped, rain fell softly at night, and fat little baby clouds waddled across the sky during the day. I went for a walk in a light blouse and a floaty skirt one day; on another, our anemic house plants took a vacation on the front porch. We kept the windows open while I tinkered in the kitchen and my husband built a baby grand piano case in the basement (no really, he did. It's a damn fine piano case, too.)

I know the Weather Fairy is teasing us, pretending she won't dump a foot of snow in south-central Kansas before next week. And though Valentine's Day still looms ahead, I'm pining for daffodils like the parrot in Monty Python's Flying Circus was "pining for the fields."

Though I'm not lying prostrate at the bottom of a bird cage while I pine.

Perhaps I'm just too jealous of the weather people are enjoying in Florida. Did you know it's citrus season down there? Aran of Cannelle et Vanille has me whipped into a frenzy with her strawberry-filled macaroons, blood orange sorbet, and Meyer Lemon souffles. Her blogs are a delight for the eyes and crack for my salivary glands. Perhaps I'm just in love with the idea of Patricia Scarpin's lime yogurt cake.

Call it cabin fever or citrus envy, but I'm taking desperate measures. If no citrus is in season, I will season the season with citrus flavors. I'm bringing out the orange oil and the lemon juice. Until we have berries again, I'll make tarts with last summer's mulberries and frozen cranberries from Thanksgiving. I will season my jasmine rice with lime juice from the green squeezy bottle and hold my head high!

I started with biscotti. Just in time for my grocery store's Easter rollout, I've made chocolate chip biscotti with orange essence. They taste just like one of those foil-covered chocolate oranges, only better (and without the risk of accidentally eating foil.) If that's not enough orange for your discerning palette, you can up the orange by dicing some candied orange peel to fold in with the chocolate chips.



Chocolate chip biscotti with orange
makes about two dozen dunking cookies

• 1/2 cup olive oil
• 1 cup sugar (or a half-half mixture of xylitol and sugar)
• 2 eggs
• 1 tsp. vanilla
• 1/2 tsp. orange oil
• 1 3/4 -2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/4 cup cocoa powder
• 2 tsp. baking powder
• 1/2 cup chocolate pieces
• pinch sea salt
  

In a medium bowl, cream together sugar and oil. Beat in eggs with a whisk, then mix in vanilla and orange oil. Stir in flour, cocoa powder, salt, and baking powder until just moistened. The mixture should feel like thick brownie batter against your spoon. Incorporate the chocolate chunks. Since I only had giant eggs on hand, I had to mix in another two tablespoons of flour to reach this consistency. You want to avoid a soupy batter.

Throw the biscotti batter into your freezer for a few minutes while you prepare your oven (heat it to 375 degrees Fahrenheit) and your baking sheet (grease it!) Spoon another tablespoon of cocoa powder into a small finger bowl; you'll use the cocoa to "flour" your hands and work with the biscotti batter.

Once the batter has cooled and stiffened for five minutes, remove the bowl and use your cocoa'd hands to shape the biscotti into two long "loaves" on the baking sheet. Make the biscotti loaves 3-4 inches wide and about a foot long, and separate the loaves (you may need to do this on a second sheet) by several inches. They will spread when they cook. Bake the biscotti at 375 degrees for fifteen minutes, then reduce the oven temperature to 350 degrees for the next 25-30 minutes. Remove the biscotti from the oven. Each loaf should be brown(er than uncooked cocoa-filled dough) on the outside.

Quickly (but gently) cut the loaves into 3/4-inch cookies with a sharp, thin-bladed knife. Separate the cookies, turn them on their sides, and return them to the oven for five more minutes! Once one side is crisped, flip the biscotti and cook the other side for five minutes. Let the biscotti cool to room temperature, then store in an air-tight container for up to a week. These biscotti also freeze perfectly.

Now, brew a pot of coffee, enjoy a fragrant biscotti, and hope spring comes early.

Love, love, love the bowls

I live in a television vacuum most of the time, though my husband and I own a functioning TV and digital cable. We just never remember to turn the silly device on during the week! When we do watch TV, it's late at night and we only catch re-runs of COPS and Ghost Hunters International. Had I remembered to watch television recently, I might have seen Oprah endorse the beautiful bowls Flavour Design Studio makes.

Thank heaven for Tea of Tea and Cookies, for she awakened me to the delights of the soba/ramen bowl. A few pictures from FDS's website:

The chopsticks lounge. You lounge. Lounge-perfect ramen bowls.

I feel comfort and peace when I look at these bowls. I want to pick one up, fill it with soup, and watch The Princess Bride for the 500th time, as I used to do when I was home sick from school.

Another bowl I love: the Buddha bowl. It inspires tranquility and the ability to take what life gives you daily. Sue Bender would love this bowl. She sees zen in bowls.

The baby Buddha bowl: what has life put in your bowl today?

In a few weeks, plus shipping and handling, these bowls will be mine! Here is the rest of their kitchen line, for your browsing pleasure: good bowls, good gravy!

Sometimes it sticks

The creative cooking process is not unlike throwing spaghetti at a wall. Sometimes, ideas stick. They become those golden recipes you make over and over without thought, those dishes you bring to Christmas party after Christmas party, the Reeses Peanut Butter Cups of ideas.

And sometimes an improvisation bounces off the wall onto the floor where it immediately interests your cats and becomes coated in dust. Cleaning up after this failure deflates your delicate heart. You consider in the future baking only what you can procure from a box and nothing else.

I file the following fruit of hunger-driven delirium under the first category: spaghetti that sticks to the wall.

It's a recipe that came together quickly - in as long as it took the pasta to boil - and with no lengthy, fussy ingredients, unlike other creamy sauces. Kefir lifts the sauce beyond just a creamy feeling on the tongue; its tartness livens up the peas and tomatoes without a sour aftertaste in a way that complements the basil's green taste. I added a pinch of sea salt to the finished dish to round out the creaminess, but it's easy to omit.

Vegetarians can easily make the dish meatless by substituting some leftover chickpea salad or by using a 1/2 cup of cooked chickpeas instead of the sausage below.

This pasta turned out so beautifully that the sting of using a cup of baking soda instead of 1 tsp in a cake when I was 13 years old may have finally been erased.

A version with both sausage and chickpeas

Kefir pasta with sausages
serves 2-3

Pasta and sauce

• 3 handfulls of farfalle pasta
• 1/2 cup Greek-style kefir or yogurt
• 1/3 cup basil pesto
• 1/4 cup half-and-half (or substitute milk, just not skim please)
• 1/2 tsp. sea salt
• 1 cup peas
• 1 cup quartered grape tomatoes
• 1/4 cup Romano cheese (optional)
  

Sausage topping

• 2 all-beef hot dogs or sausage links
  
• 2 tsp. honey
• 3 tb. finely chopped fresh or frozen Anaheim pepper
• 
  

Fill a medium-sized pot with water and bring it to a boil. Drop farfalle in the pot, give it a stir to separate the pasta, and let it cook while you prepare the sauce.

Next, place the tomatoes and peas in a large serving bowl and set aside. Combine pesto, milk, and kefir in a saucepan and stir over medium-low heat until the sauce bubbles (but does not boil.) Cover the saucepan, turn off the heat, and keep the sauce warm until the pasta is finished.

Drain the pasta in a colander, then and pour it over the peas and tomatoes. Forget about them.

Next, heat the hot dogs/sausage links in a skillet over medium-high heat with a splash of water. Cook them all the way through before stirring in the honey and peppers. Cover the skillet and sear the links for another 3-5 minutes. The dogs/links should be browned evenly and have a light glaze of sweet/hot goodness. As soon as they are seared to perfection, remove them from the pan and slice them into 1/2-inch pieces.

Finally, pour the cream sauce over the pasta, peas, and tomatoes, coating everything well. Sprinkle the pasta with a pinch of sea salt, pepper, and Romano cheese. Arrange the sausage links (and pepper pieces!) on top of the pasta, and serve with a green salad on the side.

Sleepover extreme

Golly gee, what an exciting few days! We whizzed right through Kansas Day on Thursday, the Grand Opening of the Donut Whole Friday, Sleepover Saturday and skipped into Superbowl Sunday. In-between major social appearances, Raymond and I squeezed in little events - visiting a friend in the hospital, watching Revolutionary Road, and diving into noodles at Saigon with friends. Whew. It's been busy times.

Sleepover Saturday topped the fun charts for me, though. Five college girlfriends and I took a toad trip to Miss JJ's house for junk food, magazines, nail polish, ghost stories, soda pop, and silly romance movies. Basically, we threw a party for our inner teenagers. We listened to NOW hits #5 and #6, which featured late-90s tunes from N Sync and 98 degrees. We ordered a gigantic pizza, prank-called the boys we liked (sorry Ben, Matt, and Tim!), and ate rocky road brownies. I'm minorly embarrassed to admit how quickly the seven of us finished a whole pan of brownies, but if we were actually teenagers, no sugar rush could cramp our style. I mean, how can anyone resist a dessert topped with toasty puff marshmallows?

Toasty puffs get the job done right.

The original recipe for these dulcet delicacies came from a book called Old-Fashioned Bake Sale. I used agave nectar instead of granulated sugar and added a pinch of salt to off-set the sweetness. This recipe is 1/2 the size of its original, which I thought to be less party-sized in its proportions.

Rocky road brownies

• 1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
• 3/4 cup all-purpose flour (like my favorite, Hudson Cream)
  
• 3/4 tsp. baking powder
• 1/4 tsp. sea salt
• 1/3 to 1/2 cup agave nectar (adjust for taste and batter moisture) or 1/2 cup granulated sugar
  
• 3 Tb. unsalted butter, room temperature
• 3/4 tsp. vanilla extract
• 1 large egg
• 1 cup mini marshmallows
• 1/2 cup toasted walnut pieces

Preheat your oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit and grease a small brownie pan with butter.

In a small cup, microwave 1/2 of the chocolate pieces for 20-30 seconds, then stir the melted chocolate until it's smooth. Set chocolate aside.

Combine the flour, baking soda, and sale in a small bowl. Set that aside and in yet another bowl, beat together the butter, agave/sugar, and vanilla extract until thoroughly whipped and fluffy as clouds. Mix in the melted chocolate, then carefully blend in flour mixture. Blend until everything is just combined, then spread the batter into the pan evenly. Bake the brownies for 16-20 minutes, or until an inserted toothpick inserted into the pan's center comes out slightly sticky.

Remove the pan from the oven and sprinkle your brownies with the marshmallows, remaining chocolate chips, plus the toasted walnut pieces. Turn off the oven and let the brownies warm inside for another two minutes or so, or just until the marshmallows puff up. Cool the brownies for at least 20 minutes before serving. The bars cut best with a sharp knife that has been dipped in hot water. Serve warm with ice cream.

Up-close and in person

Now that you have been inspired by this recipe, bake some of these brownies and try not to giggle over those Cosmo quizzes.