I like thin crust but not too thin, I like fresh toppings on my pizza and even though I like “the works” on my pizza, often less is more (besides the mound of toppings slides off). I like pizza baked on my pizza stone and if you don’t have one already, still time to ask Santa for me! They’re great for both baking bread and pizza and while you’re at it, ask Santa for a pizza peel…it’s those wooden paddles one uses to slide pizza or bread into an oven.

Those two kitchen tools are very important to making really good homemade pizza: the pizza stone pre-heats in the oven, emulating a brick oven and the pizza peel allows you to form your pizza on it and with a sprinkle of cornmeal under the dough, it just slides right into your oven and onto the hot pizza stone. Most pizzas take around 12-14 minutes to bake!

This pizza was inspired by one of the pizzas at that “Tweet-up”: a mushroom pizza with cheese and herbs. My take was to add a thin smear of Bechamel on the crust which contained oil or butter, flour, milk, garlic, grated cheese and a pinch of nutmeg. You can be creative here and use a favourite cheese that goes well with mushrooms. I had some sharp, aged Graviera cheese on hand and I used that for my pizza and some leftover grated Kefalotyri cheese for the Bechamel base.

Obviously you have to love mushrooms or this ain’t gonna work for you and you can again be creative and use whatever mushrooms you like. I opted from Cremini mushrooms which grow to become Portobellos when full grown. They are more flavourful as Creminis and far better than white button mushrooms. I found some affordably priced Oyster mushrooms to add variety in flavour, presentation and texture and the end result was nothing short of tremendous. This pizza makes a good case for opening a chilled bottle of white wine, getting a unncessary bad-rap. There’s a time and a place for every wine and tonight it’s white!

Mushroom Pizza

1/2 recipe for pizza dough

Bechamel

1 Tbsp. unsalted butter

1 clove of garlic, minced

1 tsp. all purpose flour

1/2 cup warm milk

grated nutmeg to taste

1/2 cup grated Kefalotyri or Romano cheese

approx. 1 cup grated Graviera, Mozzarella or Fontina cheese

2 Tbsp. extra-virgin olive oil

1 cup sliced Cremini mushrooms

1/2 cup oyster mushrooms

1 clove of garlic, minced

1 tsp. dried Greek oregano or 1/2 tsp. dried thyme

salt and pepper to taste

1/3 cup diced smoked pork loin or bacon

1 small onion, thinly sliced

cornmeal to dust the pizza stone

Pre-heated 500F oven, middle rack position

1. In a small pot, add the butter over medium heat and once melted add the flour and stir for a minute. Slowly add the warm milk while stirring and continue until the Bechamel has thickened. Add some grated nutmeg, the grated cheese and some fresh ground pepper and salt to taste. Take off the heat and reserve.
2. Pre-heat your oven with the pizza stone placed inside to pre-heat. Wipe your mushrooms with a wet towel and slice the Cremini mushrooms and place in a bowl with the Oyster mushrooms, olive oil, garlic, oregano, salt and pepper and toss well.
3. Roll (or stretch your pizza dough and place on a cornmeal dusted pizza peel or pizza pan and evenly spread the cooled Bechamel on the pizza dough. Sprinkle the grated cheese over the dough then spread your mushrooms over top followed by the sliced onions and diced smoked pork/bacon.
4. Drizzle with some olive oil and place in your pre-heated oven, reduce the heat to 450F and bake for 10-12 minutes or until the edges of your pizza just brown and your pork has just crisped. Remove from the oven, slice and enjoy! Serve with cold beer or a Peller Estates Chardonnay from Niagara.

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© 2011, Peter Minakis. All rights reserved. If you are not reading this post in a feed reader or at http://kalofagas.ca then the site you are reading is illegally publishing copyrighted material. Contact me at truenorth67 AT gmail DOT COM. All recipes, text and photographs in this post are the original creations & property of the author.

Istanbul is easy for me to reach from Greece as my homebase is Thessaloniki/Halkidiki, which is about 10 hours away by road and even closer if taking a plane. I go to Istanbul (Constantinople still for Greeks) for many reasons: the city belongs to everyone and yes, Greeks are most welcome there, the people are very kind and hospitable to tourists, it’s still an affordable city, I’m in awe of large Metropolises like Istanbul and the foods, be it on the street or in restaurants never cease to amaze me.

Last year I took a ferry boat ride to Prince’s Island, just an hour away from Istanbul and spent the day roaming the idyllic streets with the well-preserved wooden homes on streets lined with weeping willows and away from the busier tourist-lined streets. That day, breakfast was a Simit from a street vendor and a coffee and after a long day of walking, hunger pangs awoke and it would be fate that I would walk in front of a busy eatery that made Lahmacun and Pide out their brick oven.

Once again, the #1 travel rule was followed here – eat where the locals eat and this joint had benches in front crammed with Turks grabbing a quick bite for lunch – either a Lahmacun or Pide. Lahmacuns and Pide are often called Turkish pizzas: both are of a thin crust, made with fresh housemade dough and baked in brick ovens. The Lahmacun can be oval or round and the topping is usually made of a mixture of ground lamb, grated tomato, a red pepper paste, garlic, onions and peppers. The Pide is canoe shaped and the creativity in fillings/toppings is much more varied and deserving of another blog post or two.

After having this delicious twist on pizza I found myself craving Lahamacun here in Toronto and when I feel like grabbing a bite when out doing errands, I head to Mr. Pide for my Lahmacun and Pide fix. Other times, I make my own dough, roll it out to make a thin base then spread on the ground lamb mixture and massage it into the dough with my fingers. Much like homemade pizza, having a pizza stone pre-heating in your oven and forming the pizza dough on a peel will reward you with best results.

You could use ground beef here but you must look for Biber salcasi (pepper paste) which can be found at Turkish grocers. The Lahmacun topping is easily concocted using a food processor and simply whizzing the ground meat, onions, garlic, chopped tomatoes, peppers and the Biber salcasi. If you can’t find the “Biber”, a roasted red pepper should do the trick.

Less is more when it comes to Lahmacun so you should resist temptation to spread lots of the topping on the dough. This dough bakes very quickly and therefore you want the topping to cook in the same amount of time. Garnishes on Lahmacun range from salad greens to chopped onions, peppers and tomatoes, sides of peppers (pickled or hot) and fresh parsley are the usual and a wedge of lemon is ever-present for those wanting a little lemon-squeezer.

Turkish Lahmacun

(will feed 4)

1/2 of  pizza dough recipe

Ground Lamb Topping

1/2lb. of ground lamb (or beef)

1/2 green bell pepper

1 medium red onion

2 cloves of garlic

1 Tbsp. red pepper paste

1 medium tomato, peeled/concasse

1 tsp. sea salt

1/2 tsp. black pepper

1/2 tsp. chilli flakes

1 tsp. ground allspice

1 tsp. dried oregano

1/4 cup extra- virgin olive oil

1. Roughly chop all your vegetables and red pepper paste – place in the food processor and pulse into a coarse paste (vegetables should still be visible. Now add the ground lamb, some salt, black pepper, allspice, oregano and some olive oil and pulse until amalgamated. Fry off a piece of the mixture to taste then adjust seasonings, reserve.
2. Pre-heat your oven to 450F with your pizza stone set to the middle rack. Punch your  dough and squeeze out balls of dough out of your palm and place on your well-floured pizza peel. Stretch and roll out into a long oval shape and ensure the dough is thin. Carefully lift the dough up and sprinkle some cornmeal underneath so that the dough will slide off your peel and into your oven. You’ll have to bake your Lahmacuns in batches so try and fit two on your peel.
3. Take a small handle of the topping in your hands and spread it with your fingers, massaging it into the dough and getting as near to the edges as possible. Slide the Lahmacuns into your pre-heated oven for 7-8 minutes or until crust is just browned. Remove from the oven and serve with side garnishes of parsley, pickled hot peppers, fresh tomatoes, onions, lemon wedges (all nibbled on with Lahmacun).
4. Repeat making Lahmacuns and consider these other garnishes to top your Lacmacuns when they come out of the oven:

• a mixture of dice red & green peppers, tomatoes & onions
• top with Tzatziki or strained Greek yogurt

* Lahmacun are also made by Armenians, Lebanese and enjoyed throughout the Middle-East. My version of Lahmacun is inspired by my visits to Istanbul.

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© 2011, Peter Minakis. All rights reserved. If you are not reading this post in a feed reader or at http://kalofagas.ca then the site you are reading is illegally publishing copyrighted material. Contact me at truenorth67 AT gmail DOT COM. All recipes, text and photographs in this post are the original creations & property of the author.

My favourite Pierogies are filled with potato and cheese , boiled then fried with onions and bacon and served with dollops of sour cream.  Today’s pizza is inspired by Pierogies and the ingredients: dough, potatoes, cheese, onions, bacon, more cheese, more onions, sour cream ( I used Greek yogurt). I’m using my go-to pizza dough recipe and layering the flavours with a Bechamel sauce followed by a layer of thinly sliced potatoes. It’s important to thinly slice the potatoes so that they cook in the time it takes to bake the pizza.

The remaining toppings are sliced onions, bacon and when the pizza comes piping hot out of the oven the scallions and sour cream/yogurt complete this extravaganza pizza. Pierogi pizzaa won’t win any lean-cuisine awards but it tastes great! A worthy splurge.

Pierogi Pizza

(makes 1 large pizza)

1/2 of one pizza recipe

Bechamel

1 Tbsp. unsalted butter (or olive oil)

1 tsp. of all-purpose flour

1/2 cup warm milk

salt and pepper to taste

fresh grated nutmeg to taste

1/2 cup grated sharp white cheese

4 medium Russet or Yukon Gold potatoes, peeled and thinly sliced with a mandoline

2 Tbsp. olive oil

2-3 cloves of garlic, minced

1 tsp. fresh thyme leaves

1 small onion, thinly sliced

1 cup grated aged cheddar cheese

4 strips of bacon, chopped

chopped chives/scallions for garnish

sour cream or Greek yogurt for garnish

Pre-heated 500F oven, rack set to middle position

1. In a small pot, add the butter over medium heat and once melted add the flour and stir for a minute. Slowly add the warm milk while stirring and continue until the Bechamel has thickened. Add some grated nutmeg, the grated cheese and some fresh ground pepper and salt to taste. Take off the heat and reserve.
2. Pre-heat your oven with the pizza stone placed inside to pre-heat. Peel your potatoes and thinly slice with a mandoline and place in a bowl with the olive oil, minced garlic, , thyme, salt and pepper to taste.
3. Roll (or stretch your pizza dough and place on a cornmeal dusted pizza peel or pizza pan and evenly spread the cooled Bechamel on the pizza dough. Now lay the potato slices on the dough in a slightly overlapping circular scheme followed by sprinkling the sliced onions, grated cheddar and finally the bacon.
4. Slide the pizza into your pre-heated oven and reduce to 450F and bake for 10-12 minutes or when the bacon is crisp and pizza crust just browning. In the meantime chop your chives (or scallions) and place your yogurt or sour cream in a squeeze bottle with some vegetable stock to slightly dilute it (make it squeezeable). When your pizza is ready, remove from the oven and squirt the yogurt/sour cream on it and garnish with fresh chives or scallions.

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© 2011, Peter Minakis. All rights reserved. If you are not reading this post in a feed reader or at http://kalofagas.ca then the site you are reading is illegally publishing copyrighted material. Contact me at truenorth67 AT gmail DOT COM. All recipes, text and photographs in this post are the original creations & property of the author.

Boy am I glad I tried potato pizza out! This is another case of trying something (anything) out and if you like it…you’ve added a new dish to your repertoire and if you don’t – the dish never has to touch your lips again. I’m a big fan of dishes with the very basic of ingredients – where a certain combo of ingredients is so simple yet they fly just under the radar, evading our attention. Such is the beauty of this potato pizza.

You can use store-bought pizza dough but making your own is fun and the result is so much better. This is another dish where high quality olive demands to be used here. Don’t settle for olive oil from big-box stores or those folks that also dare to market “light olive oil”. Read the label, buy extra-virgin olive oil and know that $6.99 will not buy you quality olive oil.

The absolute must for this recipe is to slice the potatoes thin, we’re talking wafer-thin so that the potato cooks in the period needed for the pizza dough to bake. The best way thinly slice your potatoes is with mandoline. Visit your local cookware store and ask to see what’s in stock. There are many affordable mandolines out there, like this one.

I bake bread and make pizza using a pizza stone and a pizza peel/paddle but if you don’t have these kitchen tools you can still pull-off a really good pizza. Open the dough, place in a round pan and you’re good! I made this last night, was kinda stuck for a dinner option and thought to make the potato pizza. Rave reviews from family (even the older folks liked it) and I’ll looking forward to having this again…Lent or not!

Potato Pizza – Πατατοπιτσα (Νηστισιμοι)

half of one pizza recipe

four medium-sized potatoes (Yukon Gold or Russet), peeled and thinly sliced with a mandoline

4 cloves of garlic, minced (or 1 tsp. garlic powder)

1 tsp. coarse sea salt

1/2 tsp. fresh ground pepper

1 tsp. dried Greek oregano

1/3 cup extra-virgin Greek olive oil + extra for drizzling

1 small red onion, thinly sliced

fresh rosemary

coarse sea salt

Pre-heated 450F oven

1. Place your pizza stone in the oven and pre-heat. Sprinkle some cornmeal on a pizza peel/paddle, then place your dough on it and roll out or press out the dough with your fingers and carefully stretch out into a 15-inch (approx) circle. In a large bowl, add the potatoes, garlic, salt, pepper and oregano and toss until well-coated. Lay the potatoes in a circular overlapping fashion until the dough is covered. Give the peel/paddle a shake to make sure your dough moves and you have enough cornmeal underneath.
2. Now top with sliced red onions, drizzle with some olive oil, sprinkle with a bit of sea salt and top with some fresh rosemary. Open your oven door, slice the pizza onto the pre-heated pizza stone and bake for 12-15 minutes or until the edges and top of pizza are golden-brown. Take out of the oven and and drizzle with extra-virgin olive oil. Cut into slices and serve with a Gerovassliou Chardonnay.

If you are not reading this post in a feed reader or at  http://kalofagas.ca then the site you are reading is illegally publishing copyrighted material. Contact me at truenorth67 AT gmail DOT COM. All recipes, text and photographs in this post are the original creations & property of the author.

© 2007-2011 Peter Minakis

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© 2011, Peter Minakis. All rights reserved. If you are not reading this post in a feed reader or at http://kalofagas.ca then the site you are reading is illegally publishing copyrighted material. Contact me at truenorth67 AT gmail DOT COM. All recipes, text and photographs in this post are the original creations & property of the author.

The first of today’s trio is a Black-Eyed Pea Salad. You’ll find black eyed peas in a dried variety or on the shelf of your grocery store among the array of other canned beans and legumes. Much like any other canned legume, canned black-eyed peas are a wonderful convenience product that require only a quick rinse.

This salad is easy to prepare, includes ingredients accessible to most and it’s colourful, delicious and healthy (loaded with iron). In the summertime, try adding some micro-greens like purslane.

Black-Eyed Pea Salad

1 250gr. can of black-eyed peas, rinsed & drained

1/2 red onion, diced

1/2 red bell pepper, diced

1/2 yellow bell pepper, diced

1/2 green bell pepper, diced

1/2 English cucumber, diced

2 scallions, chopped

2-3 radishes, finely diced

1 small bunch of fresh dill, finely chopped

1 small bunch of flat leaf parsely, finely chopped

1 large, ripe tomato, diced

1/2 cup extra-virgin olive oil

2 Tbsp. red wine vinegar

sea salt and black pepper to taste

1. In a large bowl, add your your black-eyed peas along with the remaining chopped vegetables and herbs. If preparing ahead of time, add the tomatoes just before serving and then toss in to incorporate.
2. Add your olive oil, vinegar and season with salt and pepper according to taste. Toss and serve cool or at room temperature

The next dish in our first Lenten trio is the Ladenia. Some call it the Greek pizza but it is said the Ladenia has been around long before pizza. Parallel universes or perhaps a pizza in it’s earliest stages? I’l allow the historians to debate that. I’m here to share Greek food – delicious Greek food.

The Ladenia comes from the Greek island of Kimolos, a tiny island near Milos, in the southwest Cyclades. Ladenia has quickly become a family favourite and it’s lighter than your usual pizza, bold tastes of olive oil, onions, tomatoes come through and as long as you have tasty tomatoes on hand, you Ladenia will be a delicious success.

I first made Ladenia last year and you can view the recipe details here.

The third dish in today’s Lenten trio is “Octopus Ksidato”. Ksidato in Greek refers to a dish where vinegar reigns prominent in a dish. Here, I’ve used some wonderful baby octopus I source from one of my fish mongers.

Most octopus found in the markets here comes frozen and most are of good quality, cleaned, no ink or beak to tend to or trim. The biggest concern about cooking octopus is assuring that it’s rendered tender – NOT rubbery.

I’ve found the best method to tenderizing an octopus is to place it a pot, cover it and place over high heat. You will soon hear bubbling and gurgling and when you uncover the the pot, you’ll the octopus boiling in it’s own liquid!

No need to add water, aromatics here…the braising liquid will do all the work. Just reduce the heat to medium-low, cover and braise the octopus in it’s own liquid for about 45 minutes to an hour (depending on the size of your octopus).

Check for tenderness by a applying a fork or a knife…it should slide easily through. Finally, I’ve braised many an octopus and I must again recommend adding one one cork into the pot during the braising period.

It is said that their’s an enzyme in the cork that helps to tenderize the octopus  and I believe it. That is not to say your octopus will be tough if you don’t employ the cork method but I’m just sayin’…it will be more tender!

Octopus With Vinegar   (χταπόδι ξιδάτο)

1 -1 1/2 lb. of octopus (I used baby octopus)

extra-virgin olive oil

red wine viengar

fresh ground pepper

dried Greek oregano or thyme

1. Place your octopus in a pot along with a wine cork and cover and place over high heat. After you hear the liquid release and boil for about 5 minutes, reduce to medium-low and braise the octopus in it’s own liquid for about 45-60 minutes.
2. Remove the octopus from the liquid and if a large octopus, cut up into bite sized pieces.
3. Place in a bowl and add some extra-virgin olive oil, some red wine vinegar, fresh black pepper and some dried Greek oregano or thyme.
4. Serve warm or at room temperature.

If you are not reading this post in a feed reader or at  http://kalofagas.ca then the site you are reading is illegally publishing copyrighted material. Contact me at truenorth67 AT gmail DOT COM. All recipes, text and photographs in this post are the original creations & property of the author.

© 2007-2009 Peter Minakis

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© 2009, Peter Minakis. All rights reserved. If you are not reading this post in a feed reader or at http://kalofagas.ca then the site you are reading is illegally publishing copyrighted material. Contact me at truenorth67 AT gmail DOT COM. All recipes, text and photographs in this post are the original creations & property of the author.