For The Love of Pizza

Andy and I had this great conversation the other night.  I was slicing up pizza for dinner- the second pizza dinner within four nights, and I apologized for the pizza.  It was homemade, but we’d just had it.  The thing with pizza is that once you buy a round of ingredients, there’s plenty for a few pizza nights.  I make up some homemade dough, and a quick and easy dinner that everyone loves is ready in no time.   Andy was suprised by my apology and we both came to the agreement that as long as the pizza was of the homemade variety, we just can’t seem to get sick of it.  This is helped along by the fact that the toppings may vary- depending on any leftovers we had lurking about.  This time, we had some leftovers.

We had made the previously mentioned smoked duck for Thanksgiving, but a small container of it had been leftover and stashed in the freezer.  As I pondered what to do with this lovely smokey duck breast, I surmised that it might just make a great pizza topping.  I thought about this and thought about this, and when Zander asked for pizza for dinner, the duck came out of the freezer, and a rummage through the fridge yielded one of the tastiest pizzas ever.

This pizza began with my standard pizza crust.  My recipe makes dough for two good sized pizzas.  Usually, one pizza is for the kids- sans the onions, mushrooms and anything else deemed strange at the time.  The other pizza is whatever Andy and I want it to be.  I divided my dough, stretched one half to fit my sheet pan and popped it into the 500ºF oven for 4 minutes- just enough to firm it up a bit.   I had decided that I wasn’t going to use sauce for this pizza- I didn’t want the sweet tomato sauce to take over the layers of flavor I had intended to build.  So instead, I smashed and minced a garlic clove, placed it in a small dish along with 1/4 teaspoon of crushed red pepper flake.  To these, I drizzled over some sun-dried tomato infused olive oil- not quite two tablespoons if I had to hazard a guess.  I stirred this around a bit and then used a pastry brush to smear a layer of garlic/red pepper/olive oil over my hot pizza crust.  Oh- if you could have been in my kitchen to smell that! Yum!

The oil mixture was sprinkled with a standard mozzarella, and then the toppings.  Previously, I’d sauteed up a cup or so of sliced cremini mushrooms, so those went on the pizza along with my thawed and chopped duck breast.  I then chopped up three scallions and sprinkled that on, followed by another smattering of mozzarella cheese.  At the last moment, I reached into the fridge and pulled out some crumbled gorgonzola and sprinkled a bit of that on as well.  Into the oven the pizza went, tantalizing us with the most amazing smells to come from pizza night.   We were not disappointed.

The combination was absolutely perfect- and the gorgonzola was the perfect glue to tie everything together.  Sweet scallions, earthy mushrooms, smokey duck, hot red pepper flake and pungent garlic mingled beautifully with the creamy gorgonzola and salty mozzarella.  It was so good- we would take a bite, chew it thoughtfully, and then look back at the slice, to make sure we’d really just eaten a bite of homemade pizza.  This followed by another bite- certain it can’t be that good- and so it went until we ate almost an entire pizza, just the two of us.

Pizza is king in our house right now, and I just don’t see him being dethroned anytime soon.  It seems like the more unusual combinations we come up with, the more addicted we get to this humble savory pie.   Are there any pizza combinations that you’ve newly discovered and would love to share?  What tickles your tastebuds and keeps you coming back for just one more slice?  We’re dying to know, and who knows, maybe your pizza will be the next one we try and sing the praises of.