Pork Chops & Chicken

Tomato Pie

 

 

Fellow food blogger Claudia Lamascolo of the blog What's Cookin' Italian Style Cuisine, once posted on her Facebook page, a simple picture of a take-out tomato pie. A classic New York, and New Jersey style pizza with Sicilian roots.

She later whipped up her own version here.

Having everything here that I needed to make this pie, I decided to give it a try. I had the herbs and tomatoes and a little bit of Parmesan and Romano cheese for it as well.

Most tomato pie recipes show only tomato sauce pizzas. I wanted to make mine a bit heartier. I don't know how traditional this makes my pie or not, but it ended up being wonderful. Sicilian sauce pie verses covered pie.

 

Crust:

Linda Larsen's Thick Pizza Crust

This has been my go-to pizza crust recipe forever now. I love it. It's simple, and it works really well especially for recipes like this that call for a thick, foccacia like pizza crust.

• 2 pkgs. active dry yeast
• 4 cups flour
• 1/2 cup warm water
• 1 tsp. salt
• 1 cup warm water

In large bowl, combine yeast, 1/2 cup flour, and warm water in a bowl and mix well. Cover and place in warm, draft-free place; let rise for 30 minutes. Stir down batter. Add 2 cups flour, salt, and 1 cup warm water and beat well. Gradually add enough of the remaining flour to form a soft dough. Turn down onto a lightly floured board and knead for 10 minutes. Place dough in a greased bowl, turning to grease top. Cover and let rise until double, about 1 hour.

Punch down dough and roll to 16" round. Place in greased 14" round deep dish pizza pan and form a raised edge. Let dough rise for 30 minutes. Then top with desired toppings and bake at 425 degrees for 20-30 minutes until crust is deep golden brown.

**I used a 10.5 X 15.5 jelly roll pan. You will have some left over dough which I will show you what I did with mine later on.

 

Toppings:

8-10 tomatoes (4 or 5 plum tomatoes and 4 or 5 medium sized beefsteak tomatoes)
1/3 to 1/2 jar of seasoned tomato/pasta sauce
4 or 5 cloves freshly minced garlic
Dried Italian seasonings
Fresh Basil
Grated Romano
Grated Parmsean

 

Slice each tomato thinly to be used as a row of tomatoes on your pie. Cover the raised dough with a genrous layer of tomato sauce. Then spinkle a light amount of the dried Italian herbs all over the tomato sauce. Next take the minced garlic and distribute evenly over the herbs and tomato sauce.

Now take one of the sliced beefsteak tomatoes and layer it on top of the sauce, herbs, and garlic. Layer it along the short side of the jelly roll pan. Then take one of the plum tomatoes and layer it slightly on top of the beefsteak tomatoes forming your next row. Continue the pattern all the way down.

 

Take the fresh basil and rip them into small spices and toss over the top of the layered tomatoes. You can roll the leaves and dice it too if you prefer. Sprinkle more Italian herbs on top. And then sprinkle a light amount of the Parmsean and Romano on top.

Bake according to the pizza crust directions. 25-30 minutes. Slice in squares and serve. Can be served cold the next day as leftovers and it's still awesome.

 

 

For that left over bit of dough, I made pizza pot pies. I copied this idea from the famous Chicago Pizza and Oven Grinder Co. I have been fascinated with this idea of baking a pizza backwards and serving it up really simply in a bread bowl crust. So I had enough dough to try it and a couple of medium sized ramekins or souffle dishes just perfect for this idea. It was real simple to be honest and it tasted amazing. With cheese pizza, the only difference would be stacking cheese at the bottom and then building your pizza backwards with sauce on top and then the dough. I believe you would want to used sliced cheese and not shredded cheese.

Form a thick round and cover the top of your ramekin. Make sure there is enough dough for a 1 inch lip or so to hang over the sides. Press the dough tightly around the sides but make sure it's not indented with finger lines. Place on a baking sheet and stick in the oven. When the they are done baking (same amount of time and temp as the pizza) let them cool for about 2-5 minutes and then using a knife, edge it around the dough and the ramekin to loosen it up. Flip it over on a plate and remove the ramekin. It should all fall out into the crust bowl. Viola! Pizza Pot Pie.

 

 

Make sure you drink a nice fresh Czech Pilsner with this pizza. Tomatoes and pilsners are made for each other.

 

 

Chicken Adobo The Duo Dishes Style

 

Some awesome food blogger friends of mine, Chrystal and Amir, of the affable The Duo Dishes, recommended that I try their chicken adobo. Their version of the Filipino classic. I loved it so much I have been making it about once a week since I first found out about it. It's so easy and once you buy the ingredients it lasts you enough for four or five rounds of it not counting fresh ingredients like the scallions, chicken, and parsley.

 

Chicken Adobo with Coconut Ginger Rice – Serves 4

4 chicken thighs (bone-in)
1/2 cup low sodium soy sauce
1/2 cup apple cider vinegar
3 bay leaves
3 cloves garlic, minced
12 peppercorns, crushed
1 tablespoon brown sugar
1 tablespoon cornstarch
2 tablespoons grapeseed oil
1/4 cup water
1 cup chicken broth
1 1/2 cups rice
3 cups water
2 tablespoons fresh ginger, minced
1/3 cup shredded sweetened coconut, minced
1/2 cup parsley, minced
4 scallions, chopped
Kosher salt

** I used a bit more dark brown sugar for this and no parsley for the rice. I can't get small bushells of parsley at my grocery stores and I don't like buying it for small amounts in recipes only for the rest of it to be wasted. I know I should find other recipes to use it in but I don't cook every day. So I doubled up the scallions.

I marinated the chicken for 4 hours. You can marinate for 1 hour if you are short on time, but 4 hours is good. I also squeezed in 6 thighs with this recipes.

 

1. In a large bowl or flat dish, combine soy sauce, vinegar, garlic, peppercorns, brown sugar and bay leaves with chicken. Marinate for at least an hour or overnight.

 

2.  When ready to cook, swirl a bit of olive oil in a pan. When the oil is hot, lay chicken thighs down, leaving marinade in the dish. Brown chicken on both sides, approximately 2-3 minutes on each side.

3. Remove chicken from the pan and set aside. Pour in marinade and chicken broth and cook until it begins to boil.

 

4. Once boiling, add chicken again and cover. Cook for about 10 minutes.

 

5. Whisk 1/4 cup water with cornstarch and add to chicken. Turn chicken pieces over, cover again and cook until juices run clear (approximately 6-9 minutes).

** I left the chicken cooking for about an hour all together and while the rice was cooking.

 

6. For rice, set 3 cups of water to boiling. Sprinkle a little salt into the water. When water begins to boil, add rice and cook according to directions. Once done, toss with scallions, parsley, ginger and coconut.

** I use 3 cups of chicken stock and butter for my rice. It's much more flavorful. I buy it in bulk at Costco and it's a great way to plow through it and have more flavorful dishes.

 

7. Serve chicken over chicken and drizzle with a little sauce.

 

Dim Sum @ Yank Sing, San Francisco

Lunch with the The Duo Dishes. WORD!

I arrived in San Francisco for the FoodBuzz Bloggers Festival a day early. Checked out the beer scene a little bit and laid low. The next day Chrystal and Amir came in from LA. They run the affable food blog The Duo Dishes. They also happen to be some of my favorite people. Especially after the weekend.

They called me when they got into to town and we were all starving. I got wind on a great Dim Sum place at Rincon Center in SOMA (South of Market st.). The place was called Yank Sing. This came recommended by my friend Anat Baron.

As soon as we got in, the whole place was rocking. We sat down and started ordering before our coats were off.

Immediately they put down in front of us sticky shrimp and candied walnuts.

Then we ordered some stuffed mushrooms.

Fried crab claws with minced shrimp filling.

Spring rolls and pan fried raviolis.

These were probably some of the best sticky BBQ pork buns I have ever had. They were not like traditional Chow Shao Bao with the sticky, steamed dough. But the center was traditional and amazing. These were coated in honey too.

What you need to know about Yank SIng. Its amazing food. And the rounds of food do not stop coming. But you need to caution yourself. It's rich food and you will fill up fast. Also Yank Sing is expensive. We didn't order all that much for 3 starving people and got slapped with a $100 dollar check. But having said that, it was worth it. Best Dim Sum I have had in ages.

After we left Yank Sing we saw a guy named T-Dub right next door at a Taqueria demoing his famous ribs.

Strange place for some ribs at a taqueria. But who cares these ribs were the effing bomb! T-Dub you know what you are talking about!

And that's how you do lunch with The Duo Dishes.