Sassy Radish

Dear readers, I’ve got some good entries sitting on the back burner that I just can’t seem to finish up at this point in time. The kitchen has been somewhat abandoned lately, in favor or trying to soak in the summer nights, friends, wine and the ever-addictive spin classes. And on top of everything, there’s been some bumps on the road, a bit of turmoil here and there that is increasingly needing more of my attention, which, sadly, comes at the cost of cooking and writing.

I’m taking a short’ish break and hope that you all will be here when I return. I’m sorry to just up and disappear, but I need some bandwidth to tend to more pressing matters at the moment.

I leave you with two pictures (and I must apologize for their quality as they were taken with my blackberry!) that I took while wading around a Chinatown grocery store. I found them pretty humorous and hope you do as well. I think they speak for themselves and any commentary, witty or otherwise, would detract from them. So enjoy.

Now, I might just go ahead and post a recipe in the next few days (proving myself wrong), but I wanted to at least partly explain my radio silence.

I hope everyone is enjoying their summers and taking advantage of all the bounty that’s currently in season!

Sometimes letting the recipe speak for itself if the best thing ever. Which is why I will keep this short and sweet and flood your screen with pictures and just the recipe. Pizza dough is one of the easiest things to make, and yet it gives you an amazing sense of accomplishment and this certain satisfaction of working with your hands.

I was very scared of working with yeast, and I’m not sure why. For some reason I thought it was a temperamental thing, yeast, that would not yield to me. But it did and so beautifully too. Pizza dough is going to be a regular thing, I tell you. And if you are short on time and can’t wait 2 hours for it to rise, just stick it in the fridge overnight and the next day it’ll all be ready for you. You just have let the dough come to room temperature, which could take a bit of time, but at least you have your work already done.

I can’t tell you how easy this was and how much fun! Clean-up, I’ll confess was way less fun as scraping the doughy bits off the granite counter took Herculean patience – they are sticky little buggers. But it’s well worth the effort, I promise you. And unlike delicate pastry dough that fears humidity, this dough is way more robust. Just prepare for your apartment to heat up substantially – as the temperatures you’ll be using to cook your pizza will be scorching hot!

And speaking of scorching hot, July is finally upon us and with it are the scorching temperatures. I hope everyone’s 4th of July is festive, hot, and filled with picnics!

Continue reading potato, onion and swiss chard pizza.