Mise En Place & An Italian Dinner

A tremendous sense of accomplishment - since this post.


I actually practiced mise en place today - dutifully preparing my onions, garlic and thawing my minced beef for my spaghetti bolognese sauce in the morning. I sliced my button mushrooms. I even took the time to caramelize my onions for my pizzas. Yes, I am naturally scatterbrained by nature - so cooking is good practice in disciplining my thoughts and actions (yes it's an excuse but it's a good one, no?)

Ahh - mise en place (can you tell I love this phrase?)

Did I mention yesterday that pizza dough is a breeze? Well, today that statement came back to bite me. What happenned? I measured everything and proofed my yeast like a well seasoned pro. Then when I poured the yeast mixture into the flour and started to stir the dough it remained sticky and refused to leave the sides of the bowl. No sweat, I thought - I followed Giada's advice and started feeding it 1 tbsp of flour at a time and then stirring again to incorporate.

After ending up adding more than 10 tbsp's flour extra (one tbsp at a time and each time the dough got stiffer and stiffer) I start to understand why other bloggers recommend a stand mixer for this. I ended up wrestling with the dough, after each tbsp of flour I willed the dough to come together and got more and more worried. It got to the point that I actually fretted that my negative vibes might have an effect on the dough - yes I just said that.

With sweat dripping down my face and arms burning - finally things started to look more familiar. Instead of leaving the whole ball of dough to rise, I divided it into individual balls of dough - ready for punching down and rolling into pies small enough to fit into my little toaster oven.

Despite my worries about the bad mojo, the yeast were not affected and merrily set to work. In the 1 hour the balls of dough puffed up nicely and swelled to more than twice their size.

White sauce for topping:
Milk
Cornstarch
Herbs - I used dried parsley and oregano flakes
Cheese - I used ordinary cheddar and some stronger gruyere

Heat milk in heavy bottomed saucepan. When warm, remove app. 3 tbsp and whisk in cornstarch till dissolved.
Return the hot milk mixture and add herbs and cheeses.
Continue reducing the mixture until it looks thick and sticky.

For the topping, I tossed my button and oyster mushrooms in some olive oil and salt, and caramelized some saute thinly sliced onions in olive oil over low heat until soft and starting to colour, add sugar to taste and stir stir stir).

We made mini pizzas and each one took app. 4-5 minutes to prebake. Once the top was cooked and slightly puffed up I topped the base with the sauce and scattered my onions and mushrooms, the continued baking for a few more minutes until cheese was bubbling and the crust looked nice and crispy.

Would I do this again? Definitely. The crunch of the thin, crispy crust against the gooey cheese sauce, along with the salty, earthy, slightly chewy mushrooms.....AK said that it reminded him of the thin-crust pizzas we practically lived on in Rome.