Sunday night was pizza night in our house.
Living some 185km from the closest Pizza Parlour meant home delivery wasn’t going to happen.
Lucky I have 3 boys who are very adept in the kitchen. Many of my real world friends will recall the story of Andrew, a couple of years ago, cooking spaghetti bolognese from scratch.
Rob and I were drafting cattle in the yards when Andrew, who was at the house, noticed, while taking the washing from the line, that I hadn’t taken anything out of the freezer for dinner. He took the initiative to prepare something quick and easy, and being in charge of the menu plan, thought spaghetti bolognese would tickle everyone’s fancy. Undeterred by the frozen mince, he started to defrost the packet, before deciding that would take too long, and (like many of us I’m sure!) prodded a lump of mince around the frying pan to hasten it’s browning. Being a new age cook, he did inform me that he had intended to Google the bolognese recipe but had a few glitches with his internet connection, so instead pulled out the trusty cookbook. Rob and I, returning from the yards after the sun had set and well prepared to feed the family eggs on toast, were amazed to walk into the kitchen and find the meal plated up with grated cheese on top. Over dinner, Andrew admitted that all had not gone exactly to plan and he’d modified the recipe. The reason being, the recipe had asked for red wine and he couldn’t open the bottle!
Staying with Italian theme, on this occasion he led his apprentices on a blokier endeavour. His inspiration for the pizza was taken from the Matthew Hayden’s cookbook although after cooking this a few times he now has his own modifications.
The base was a masterpiece in itself, made like a pro, yeast and all! A feat that I usually render to the ‘too hard basket’ and go with the yoghurt and flour option. Speaking of flour, after 3 boys kneaded and rolled the bases the kitchen did look like a flour bomb had gone off……
Portions were considered, with eight home for dinner the boys calculated that two pizzas should suffice. Improvisation was again the key. Our pantry was bare of tomato paste so they used some leggo pasta sauce with peanut paste mixed through (a trick learnt a few moons ago from Uncle Blair) for the topping. Here the pizza’s varied: One for the adults (loaded with nutritious stuff like onion, spinach and tomato) and the kid’s one, comprising of ham, chorizio, loads of tin pineapple and cheese.
The smell was so scrumptious that it bought Tess home from a weekend of mock-campdrafting horses at ‘Kimberley’. She left with one horse and returned home with six…..
Not only do the little men in our house love pizza, they love to cook pizza. For me, dinner always tastes better when you don’t have to make it!
Wiping up flour from the benchtops on the other hand…….well I guess it comes with kids in the kitchen!?
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