Someone asked me for my pizza recipe, so here it is.

Dough

1/2 package dry yeast
1/2 cup very warm (but not hot) water
1 3/4 cups flour
1 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. sugar
1 tbs. oil

Put the yeast, sugar, and water in a medium-sized bowl, mix well, let sit for about five minutes.

Throw everything else into the bowl with the yeast mixture, mix well, let sit for about ten minutes.

Remove dough to a hard floured surface and knead heavily for about ten minutes. (three songs, if you’re cooking to music, and how could you NOT?) Put the dough back in the bowl and let it rise for about a half hour.

Spread the dough thinly over a large oiled pizza or cookie pan. Make lots of bumps in it with your fingers.

Sauce

1 can tomato sauce
1 tsp. oregano
1 tiny can of tomato paste
1 1/2 cups of mozzarella cheese
toppings, whatever

Pour the tomato sauce over the dough; spread evenly. Sprinkle with oregano. Add whatever toppings you like.

Bake in a 420 degree oven on the bottom rack for about fifteen minutes. When the pizza’s bottom (I love saying that) is done, remove pizza from oven and sprinkle the cheese all over it, and dot with tomato paste. Return to oven for about five minutes or until the cheese is melted.

Let pizza sit for a few minutes before you slice it.

Gourmet chefs will no doubt make their own pizza sauce, but I’m usually in a hurry and I use the plain ol’ tomato sauce and just jazz it up a little. A VERY little. Pizza isn’t a complicated food to make, you know.

Neopolitan women would send their week’s worth of unbaked loaves of bread to the big village ovens, and then make pizza with the little bit of leftover dough. It was a simple meal, easy to make, and it offered a little treat for the family and a respite from the kitchen for the baker, after all those hours of kneading a week’s worth of bread for a family.

Hub is still playing MorrowWind, but he did take a short break earlier tonight so we could run out, eat some Chinese food, and check out (large retail store that used to be cool till they did away with their catalog) to see if they had any great discounted deals he could spend his Christmas gift card on. They didn’t. (Are we surprised? It’s (that large retail store that used to be cool till they did away with their catalog!!)

Speaking of (that large retail store that used to be cool till they did away with their catalog), I don’t want to diss them but I’ve had four vaccuum cleaners from that store and none of them was worth a toot. They all died before a year had elapsed, and the store shrugged its massive corporate shoulders and told me I should have purchased the extended warranty, because without it I was basically screwed.

Since I went on to buy three more sweepers from (this large retail store that used to be cool till they did away with their catalog), all of which did the same thing, I should probably have to wear a dunce cap and sit in the consumer-corner forever.

Years ago, we tried to buy a refrigerator from this store. We measured carefully and gave the measurements to the salesman. He assured us that the ‘fridge we chose would fit our space.

When it arrived (about two weeks later – it’s (that large retail store that used to be cool till they did away with their catalog), remember?) the thing was over an inch too wide for our space. It seems we got the NEW version of the one we’d seen on the store floor, and the new version was an inch wider. The delivery guy had to take it back. We ended up buying a refrigerator from some other store, and we had to do it that same day because I’d removed all the food from the old ‘fridge and it had to be put somewhere.

For the next five years, I kid you not, we got about three phone calls a month from (this large retail store that used to be cool till they did away with their catalog), wanting us to buy an extended warranty for our brand-new store-brand refrigerator. I would explain politely, and the caller would apologize profusely and promise to take our name off the call list. And then the next month it would all start up again.

Sorry, (large retail store that used to be cool till they did away with their catalog). It’s not that I HATE you, but, well, I kinda hate you.

Whoever made the decision to do away with your catalog really shot you in the foot. Your catalog was awesome. It’s your stores that suck.

Up there where I said I didn’t want to diss (this large retail store that used to be cool till they did away with their catalog?) I guess I really wanted to.

Many apologies for saying that this store sucks. I come down hard on my students when they say ‘suck.’ But honestly. This store really does suck.

Their vaccuum cleaners don’t, but the stores do.