cook's night off

Peter is home for a break between his band's cruise ship gigs. He heads back out soon.

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How nice after the holiday busy-ness that he and his buddy Josh - his friend since 4th grade - wanted to buy groceries and make us Mexican pizza.

While I watched with the camera, became ravenous with the smell of Mexican seasoning and also made guacamole, I was thinking, "One pizza? There are four of us, and three are guys." So I quietly resolved to fill up on chips and guacamole if I was still hungry after my portion of pizza.

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They used one of the Boboli-type thin crusts (they're already baked and packaged in the store), ground beef sauteed with taco seasoning (if you don't have packets at the store, here's a recipe for it), vegetarian refried beans (no lard), and cheese, black olives, peppers and tomatoes, all on Josh's cool holey pizza pan that lets air circulate and make the crust crispy. Bake at 400° F for just under 20 minutes.

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So we each ooohed and aaahed while we served up our 1/4 of the pizza, dolloped on the sour cream, guac and salsa, and sat down. I dug in and after 2/3 of my piece I was so stuffed I had to push my plate away and took the rest to work for lunch the next day. The boys all felt just right after one piece.

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I'd like to get one of these high tech pizza pans for "cripsy crust," as somebody in my family used to say. Josh forgot to forget it and leave it.

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Margaritas were the perfect light accompaniment.


I ran a cut lime around the lip of my glass and dipped it in coarse salt for the photo, but we all prefer them without salt since it makes the drink too rich. Besides, salt ain't so good for you. Not that we were terribly worried about that.

Here's the guacamole recipe I use if you're interested, adapted slightly from one at Cooks Illustrated. (I can't link the actual recipe because you need a subscription, sorry.) I used four avacados for four people (yes, we are pigs).

guacamole

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1 ripe avacado

1-2 tablespoons lime juice

salt to taste - remember chips are salty

1 garlic clove, crushed

chopped cilantro leaves to taste

(*cilantro in the Western Hemisphere is the same as coriander in the Eastern Hemisphere, though when you think of cilantro you tend to think of leaves and when you think of coriander you tend to think of the dried seeds)

chopped red onion, optional

chopped tomato, optional

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Mush ingredients together with a fork to your desired consistency. I like it chunky, so I mush one half and cube the other half by slicing cubes right in the avacado shell, then scoop it out. Careful not to poke your finger with the knife through the shell.

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*This used to be me: I hate cilantro.com, then I was converted through one very delicious salad dressing.