It's PIZZA NIGHT!!!!
Tonight I made a Fresh Mozzarella and Tomato Pizza. I won't go into great detail about this recipe because it is very basic. However, the combination of fresh mozzarella, sliced Roma tomatoes, and freshly picked basil from the patio never gets old. Usually on pizza night I serve a salad as well. Tonight, I have to admit that I had a craving for seaweed salad from Whole Foods, so I mixed Italian cuisine with Japanese cuisine. As for the writer, well, he doesn't enjoy the salads on pizza night anyway. I think he eats them just to keep me and my nagging tendencies at bay. So, his salad bowl consisted of spinach, the remaining Roma tomato slices, shredded mozzarella cheese, and almond slivers (yea you caught me...cleaning out the pantry as usual).
The cook is right...
The writer appreciaties everything I get from my beautiful woman, but as I have made perfectly clear, the salad is always an afterthought.
The pizza, however, was another raging success.
The topper, besides the salty cheese, crispy crust, and fresh tomatos, was the hand- picked Basil.
If you know the cook, you will know that her talents for culinary creation to not apply to her experiences with growing plants, flowers, or for this purpose, herbs.
She has claimed more lives than Charles Manson, and at times, I had the feeling she should be sentenced to the same barred fate.
The cook receives a plant for her birthday...dead before a week into her new year. A flower for a romantic occasion, I hope you like your rose petals crispier than your pizza crust! And then there was the basil.
After completing the heavy lifting of our move to our first home, and buyoed by the excitement and adventure of first-time homeownership, the cook went shopping and felt like tackling a difficult project. She picked a tiny Cleveland Browns-orange pot that already had Basil seeds planted deep in it's soil, and decided she would parent the infant herb.
At first, going through the collection of horror stories and crime scene photos from earlier experiences, I was cynical as she gently watered the soil and placed it on the window sill in our kitchen.
If you have ever been to our house, you would know that during the day the kitchen gets really bright. There are two windows side-by-side, nine foot white ceilings, and earthy yellow walls that reflect the retrieved sunlight like a room of mirrors.
It is the equivilent of our poor new plant being held under the spotlight of a coroner's investigation room, being prodded for clues during it's unenviable autopsy.
But what seemed to be a sure fate on the last page of the classifieds, started tunring out to be a lively, sprouting herb.
And the longer she watered, the more powerful it's presence. And the more sun it consumed, the stronger it grew and greened. Soon, it had outgrown it's tiny pot, and needed to be replanted into a full-sized vessel.
She even adapted to our varmin circumstances. New Albany was build out of farm land, and if you travel about five miles South, East, or North, you will hit corn and soy with some woods. It has become obvious that the rabbits in this area hump as their name would imply, and the little guys and gals are not shy about creeping to your backyard for a bite.
Hearing stories of neighborhood friend's struggles with the humpers, and seeing one persistent fellow in our yard every night, the cook knew she had to out smart the critter. Every night, before bed, the cook or writer go out and protect her investment by placing the Basil on top of our two-chair bistro. It might not sound like a big deal, but hey, this is our first shot at this home stuff, and every ant hill is a mountain, and every ant hill must be destroyed!
Anyways, the Basil is beautiful, and tonight, it was time to cash in a small part of the cook's profit. Buy low, sell high in investment lingo, or in gardening theory, buy seeds, and clip when they grow into leaves. (That is mine, don't steal it...my mom used to say, "Don't piss on my boots and tell me it's raining," and I thought it was rediculous. But this afternoon I was listening to the radio, and the host said the phrase verbatim. I was furious, he clearly took that from my mom. How does my know my mom? Well, I just don't want to be listening to the radio and hearing my saying, got it?)
There really is nothing like fresh herb. It tasted outstanding and the cook's maternal love from seed to leaf shined though. Much like the sun reflecting from every angle into our kitchen like the inside of a diamond, the flavors burst into every taste bud.
No comments:
Post a Comment