It's been a great spring!

Spring has been so beautiful in Los Angeles, cool breeze, sunny, but also a good amount of rain which is always needed.

And there were days with snow on the San Gabriel mountains.

With all that water, it has been blooming ever since...

Outside, by our wood fired oven I baked bread and cookies... And I planted my vegetable garden.

Happy New Pizza!

We started the year stumbling upon a great pizza…  Peter wanted to try a new dough recipe and invited his buddy Chris over for a taste.  As it often happens, Chris brought a garnish to experiment with and we had one of our own (which actually was the extra stuffing that was left over from the ravioli Peter had made earlier).  Try them both and decide which one you like best.

The Dough
Is an easy variation of our Neapolitan Pizza Dough and it makes for a crispier pie that holds up nicely  to heavier garnishes.  The variation is this:  Add 1 cup of flour to the recipe, so 5 1/2 cups of flour instead of just 4 1/2 cups.

Fennel, Mozzarella, and Fontina Garnish
We used the dish Chris brought and made this white pizza… loved it!

3 heads of fennel, quartered
1 clove of garlic, sliced thin
1 cup of vermouth or white wine
1/4 stick of butter
salt and pepper to taste
Preheat oven to 425 F.  Put fennel, garlic, vermouth, and butter in a metal pan and place in the oven.  Once the butter is melted, take the pan out to baste the fennel, then back in the oven to bake for 20 to 30 minutes, or until fennel is tender.  Let the dish cool.
Prepare the pizza pie and garnish with some of the baked fennel, sprinkling cut mozzarella and fontina cheeses on top.  Slide pizza in the wood fired oven, bake for one and one half minute, rotate, and finish baking.
Slide pizza out of the oven and before serving, add some finely chopped parsley, grated parmesan cheese and optional, a little olive oil.

Potato,  Gruyere, and Truffle Butter Garnish

Boil 3 medium potatoes in salted water.
Discard the water and pass the boiled potatoes through a ricer while still hot or mash them well. Add 1 tablespoon of truffle butter and 1/3 cup shredded gruyere cheese to the mashed potatoes and stir until melted.
Prepare the pizza pie and garnish with mozzarella cheese cut into cubes and then add a little bit of this potato mixture.  Slide pizza in the wood fired oven that has been pre-heated to 650F  bake for about one and a half minute, rotate pizza and finish baking.  This is another “white” pizza (without tomato sauce) that we really, really loved.  Great as an appetizer.

Looking back, looking forward

A heartfelt thank you to all our friends and customers who share our passion for wood fired cooking and have helped make this year a success!
Assisting a customer in finding the right pizza oven for their needs and then getting amazing feedback of how much fun they are having is something I never get tired of… Michael C. from Texas sent a great description of a party around his oven. In his own words…
Anna,
Had another party this past weekend. It was unreal. Although it was 40 degrees, folks still wanted to be outside. We had tons of food, still people were raving about the pizza. I had custom orders; we sent some folks home with to-go boxes. I ended up making 18 pies during a 5-hour period along with some wonderful bruschetta topped with home-made pesto and sundried tomatoes. The constant comments were “this is so cool; it’s the neatest thing anyone has done around here… Everyone has an outdoor kitchen with a grill and fireplace… but you have this cool pizza oven.”
Yesterday we had some friends over and Robin (her mom is Italian) got into the act and was so happy rolling the dough, topping the pizza, and cooking it. We sent her home with the pizza for her daughter. And, by the way, my 13-year old daughter is the one who rolls out the dough in my household… We have a system down. She rolls, configures, sprinkles some corn meal and flour on the peel, and places the pizza pie on the peel. I par-bake four pies, set them aside on flour and corn meal, and when we have 4 done, we garnish them and place them back in the oven. And then we do it over again. My daughter loves it!

I like Michael’s par-baking technique for saving time when feeding a large gathering of guests. I look forward to more experiments in gourmet, home baked food in the coming year.
As the old year is making way for a fresh new beginning, we gratefully share our blessings with those in needs via non profit organizations that help children and families around the world.
These are our favorites, because they focus on providing assistance in a very personal and direct way. Children Incorporated, assisting children of all races and creeds. Heifer.org giving livestock and training, it helps families improve their nutrition and generate income in sustainable ways. Sriramfoundation.org welcoming abandoned children into a stable, loving family environment.
Wishing you all a happy new year around the oven!

Getting Ready... One, Two, Three, Testing

Thanksgiving is around the corner and if you are planning to bake your holiday turkey in the wood fired oven for the first time ever, you may increase your confidence by baking a chicken as a test... and here's a quick recipe that Chris, our neighbor and friend, has shared with us many times when we fire up our oven.
Chicken a la Chris
Rinse and pat dry the chicken. Sprinkle the inside with 1/2 tablespoon sea salt and rub the outside with the same amount.  Place the chicken in a dutch oven casserole and let it reach room temperature.  Chop some rosemary, squeeze 1 lemon, mix in a bowl together with 3 tablespoons of olive oil.  Use 1/2 of this mixture on the inside of the chicken and pour the rest on the outside.  Put the cover on the casserole and slide it in the wood fired oven at about 450 to 500 degrees F and bake it for about 45 minutes.  (Check after 30 minutes.)
Check the internal temperature of the chicken, when it has reached 150 degrees F. take the casserole top off to let the chicken brown nicely.  Bake for another 10 to 15 minutes.  Serve with your favorite side dish... and lick your fingers!

Ginger-Apple Upside Down Cake

Once you have tried your hand with the chicken, check out our recipe for Holiday Turkey and invite friends and family over for a memorable meal.
The New York Times featured a story about the Philo apple farm in northern California run by the folks who founded French Laundry, and I was feeling the pangs of nostalgia for farm life again.  One day we will take a road trip up to Anderson Valley, but in the meantime I tried theirGinger-Apple Upside Down Cake and absolutely loved it!  I had gone by a friend's house that has a fabulous apple tree and harvested a basket full, so it was a timely find.  Isn't the color just yummy?
Buon appetito!

Apples from Anniko's tree

Building a good fire

Even in California the fall is showing off its first chill and some rain.  It pays off to have a good stack of dry wood saved, especially as the holidays are approaching and there’s a lot of baking to do.  And that’s the key to heating up the oven properly:  a nice stack of dry hardwood.  What is hardwood?  See the list here for the most common kinds of hardwood.

A great fire in the oven

Place the wood pieces crosswise, with the smaller pieces on the bottom, in the middle of the oven floor.  You will need about 10 or so, smaller pieces of split wood and one or two larger ones.  Place a non-toxic fire starter cube on the bottom of the stack and light it.
Keep the fire burning, adding about another 5 split logs as it burns.  After about one hour the fire is down to mostly ashes and coals. Now is the time to push the fire, or what is left of it, to the left or right side of the oven.
Wait about 10 minutes, and then brush (with a natural bristle brush) the remaining ashes off the floor to the side.  Take a temperature read with your infrared laser thermometer and you can start cooking.  You can bake your pizza right on the oven floor or you can roast meats, fish, vegetables in pans, sliding them into the oven.

This beautiful oven has plenty of wood stored...

If you are planning to roast a turkey for the holidays, you will need to make sure you have given the oven an opportunity to accumulate an extra amount of indirect heat inside the walls and floor.  So let that fire burn for an extra 15 to 20 minutes beyond the hour.
You can then scoop out the embers from the oven and place the meat inside to slowly roast with the oven door closed.
Buon appetito!

Early morning cactus bliss

There's a large cactus outside my office door that is blooming.  The flowers only open early in the morning and close as soon as the sun travels to mid-morning.  The bees line up and there's a frenzy of pollen bathing underlined by their happy humming.  It's a good way of starting the day...

After the fires... a good fire!

All our outdoor activity stopped for a long week as heat and forest fires raged and a huge smoke cloud enveloped our area.  It felt like living next to a vulcano in eruption, everything was covered in ashes. Eventually the smoke cleared and we welcomed the return of the ocean breezes,  visited our garden to harvest tomatoes and basil. With all that bounty Peter made lots of  tomato sauce and pesto.

Parmigiana di melanzane

We had been yearning for a parmigiana di melanzane (eggplant parmesan) so we slid the grill over the coals in the oven and decided to throw in some portobella mushroom al pesto while we waited for the parmigiana to fully bake.Our neighbors Jules and Ocean sniffed the aroma, dropped by and had a bite... Life was good in our neighborhood!  And the recipes easy as one, two, three... But then we had the advantage of home-made sauces, of course :)
Grilling the eggplant instead of deep frying it makes the parmigiana much lighter, while retaining all the flavor.  In a metal pan, spoon some tomato sauce on the bottom and then layer grilled eggplant, mozzarella cheese, a sprinkle of parmesan cheese, and basil.  Spoon some more tomato sauce and repeat the layering, finishing off with a good sprinkle of parmesan cheese.  Slide in your wood fired oven that is about 450 to 400 degrees or so.  It will be baked to bubbly perfection in about 20 to 30 minutes.

Layering the eggplant parmesan

The great thing about this dish is that it accumulates good taste if you leave it in the fridge overnight.  Keep this in mind if you are preparing ahead for a party.
While you wait... brush both sides of a portobella mushroom (use the cap only) with pesto sauce.  Grill both sides, top side last.  Lastly, add a slice of Provolone cheese and let it melt. Slice a good, rustic Italian bun and brush with olive oil.  Grill the bread.  Assemble mushroom in the bun  to taste as you would a burger (but please hold the mayo, ketchup, mustard!).  We were content using a slice of tomato and lettuce, to allow the burst of pesto flavor.
When grilling the mushrooms and the eggplant, go easy on the coals, as they only need medium heat to cook.  In other words, don't pile the coals high or too hot under the grill.

Grilling the portobella mushroom al pesto

Fun thing about being outdoors and it doesn't matter if your fingers get all sticky and things get out of hand... it's an easy clean-up.
Buon appetito!