A Slice of Perspective with Guile and Cheese

Take a close look. I told you I was not done with Pizza.

That's yummy melted cheese and a slice of Pepperoni. It's even crispy from the heat.

Melted cheese of different kinds, an Italian blend and Fontinella.

Look close, and you can see that it's Turkey Pepperoni. The sauce can be just about anything, but if you're near a Trader Joe's, get a jar of their Pizza Sauce.

Yea, did you look below the Pepperoni? Did you think this was just going to be any normal pizza? No, I had a single tri-lobe Manzano Pepper, that I took the top and bottom off of, and knocked the seeds out of the middle. Then I sliced it like a bell pepper, and divided it along the septa to make rings of heavenly capsicum goodness. The center is the hottest part. The top and bottom can be sliced and passed out to your guests to build confidence.

While you're using the back of a spoon to spread sauce across your crust, which is a Boboli Round in this case, gently smile as you chew on one of the top or bottom pieces. Note that it will be a gentle warm if the center of the pepper is extremely hot. If your sample is more like a bell pepper, then you've got a dud. I like to put the cheese in the middle and push it out. On large pizzas, however, a ring of cheese is much better.

Yes, this is a small Boboli. I bought a two-pack, and this was the second one. The first was identical to this in construction, except that used I pesto sauce instead of pizza sauce. Some people I know cringe at the idea of a green pizza. It's all in the degree of sauce you put on. You have to understand the power of your layers. Pesto is very strong. Go light. Note that there are no peppers in the center of the pizza. This is very important.

If there is any one piece of advice I can give to any pizza maker, it is to keep the toppings away from the center. This is pizza will fit on a 10" dinner plate when done, so I'm already crowding the center with cheese alone.

Now a thin layer of low-fat cheddar cheese. Try to keep the sheen down if you can. Less oil is better. It's not a car.

That's too much Pepperoni for a normal pizza. This is the decepticon layer. I particularly like the endless layering of the inner ring. It will make it easier to cut this pizza. Turkey Pepperoni is more forgiving of overpopulation because it has 70% less fat than regular Pepperoni. The bag says so.

The oil level in full-flavor Pepperoni is so high that you must reduce the population level. I am sure that Domino's knew this, because their 'roni was very dry. It was the Salami that was the real greaseball on the makeline.

Here I've upped the ante' with Parmesan and other fine cheeses as a topping to further entice my guests.

Perched atop the center of a blistering hot Pizza Stone, the crumbled bits of Fontinella are melting as the convection of the closed BBQ cooks the pizza from the top down. The heat from the stone is working to crisp the crust, and the crust does it's thing. Sometimes it bubbles and needs to be popped. You just don't want to make carbon out of it.


If everything goes well, and you keep your items out of the center of the pizza like a good itemizer, then you can cut your finished pizza into nice small thin slices with distinct fine points.

Yes, this Attack Formation is ready to commit sensory assault on your guests. If you've been lucky enough to get to the pepperoni stage before they visit the assembly line, then there is a good chance that they will never even see the peppers until its far too late. Take a look at the first three shots and see if any kind of dangerous hot pepper is visible.

I can report that I safely consumed this pizza with no ill effects or losses of friendship. As point of fact, the experiments have continued on the searing hot pizza stone of goodness that often warms the evening air on the rooftop deck. Several of my neighbors have been enticed by the aroma for freshly baked and risen dough, melted cheese and a variety of sauces. Not all of the pizzas have Monzano Peppers, but the majority do, and I like these the best.

And now, so do my Neighbors.

The Free Pizza Perk

Learning to pound pizza dough is as close to a fast-food job as I got. Of course, there are those that will debate me on pizza as fast-food, but considering the quantity of it that I consumed while working for Domino's, there is a pretty good chance that it is one of the reasons that a Doctor suggested that I steer clear of gluten, wheat and dairy. Let's just say that with a request like that, it's pretty easy to see why I had high blood-pressure until I changed Doctors.

Don't get me wrong, I still like pizza. It should be a mandatory food group all it's own. Required Eating as far as I am concerned. Yet, as much as I may not have liked my former Doctor's advice, it's actually pretty good advice. When I did make an effort to cut down on wheat consumption, I noticed a difference. I switched from regular pasta to rice noodles, and learned to make all sorts of interesting dishes. All of them were fantastic, provided that I took the time to make the effort. But none of them were pizza. I was trained to make pizza. I love pizza.

Now, is Domino's Pizza, Fast Food? Well, it all depends on what you order. Get a pizza with lite sauce and lite cheese, and every vegetable on the menu, and you've got a pretty healthy pizza. Switch it over to a cholesterol fest that needs 3 paper plates just to keep your jeans clean (as if you care) as the oils from the cheese and sausages drip through the cuts, soak the crust, and make you wonder if there is a spill containment kit handy. Seriously, we're talking about a pizza so oily that it completely soaks through the box and makes a red pepperoni oil-slick on the counter. You order it, we'll make it. For the 2C3P2L (*), I suggest the thick crust, but if you want regular or thin, well, you're the customer. We don't deliver napkins.

I also got to sample a number of different pizzas. There was a ritual pizza that was known as the "Crew Pie." On a busy night, there would be an lull when there were no phones ringing, and all of the drivers were out of the store. Just the crew and the manager. Since I was working inside detail, and got to anchor the makeline once in a while, I got a chance to make a crew pie. The manager gave me a few guidelines, but basically, you could make a free pizza. The food costs were going to support a little good will. Besides, I was a college student. I was hungry.

As I whipped out a masterpiece of pizza perfection, the phone rang. One of the girls grabbed it on the start of the second ring, and took the order. I put the pizza on the slow-moving belt of the CTX oven for it's 4 minute and 54 second trip to golden crispy goodness. Then another phone rang and a returning driver pounced on it as I lumbered over to the dough station to grab the tag that was just about done being written.

By the end of the next wave of the rush, two or three drivers were still in the back. One munching on a piece of crust, and the other folding a stack of boxes. I glanced at the end of the sink where we always put the crew pie, looking for the box. No Box. In the trash, a box without a label, and cut marks. Empty. I was a college student, and I was still hungry. I managed a polite chat with the manager, and he looked up with a sheepish grin which broke into a smile.

"Do like Anchovies?"

I shook my head. I could barely handle touching those slimy things when they were fresh from the can, and if they had been in a half-gallon container for a week, forget it. You just tossed then entire container, since it was useless for anything, including a new can of 'chovies. Eat Them? No.

"Well, then you'd better learn to like Jalapenos then."

Great. Sliced Pickled Jalapenos with the seeds, and the middle. I had a choice. Stinky Fish or Hot Peppers. Not something safe and sane like an Italian Pepperoncini, no, it had to be Jalapenos. Curse the Spanish for having been here first. Jalapenos. So, in my frustration, I walked over to the makeline, and selected a pristine wheel of Jalapeno. It looked so nice, and it started out so tangy that I thought it might be a joke.

I chewed. I coughed. I chewed and swallowed. I burned. I had a pizza to make. My eyes watered. I almost ripped the dough-skin. The sauce nearly hit the edge of the pizza. I was shaking so hard that the cheese left my hands effortlessly and fell correctly, and I hardly noticed from the pain in my mouth and throat.

The anguish started to subside. I managed to finish making the pizza and snag a slice of Salami in the process. Perhaps I would be able to taste it. All I could hope was that the manager was not looking at the time. From his desk, through one-way glass, he could look straight down the makeline and watch the pizzas move toward his window, make a right turn, and go into the oven. He was also on the lookout for hand-to-mouth moves.

The next day, I made it a point to discretely interview and recall what toppings people hated the most, and my manager was correct. Anchivies and Japaneno were at the top of the list, as was Pineappple. As one of the most expensive items on the makeline, it was discouraged on crew pies, but could appear, sparingly, on half. Essentially, it was a 1/4 portion. In my case, it was a necessity.

Gathering intelligence as I had, I discovered that the big eater in driver pool had no problem with hot food, but just choked on pineapple. This meant that I had to use pineapple on crew pies, just to keep this guy limited to half of the pizza. My trick was to cross, half the pizza with Jalapenos. This way, there was a quarter of the pie that was both Pineapple and Jalapeno. To keep the drivers from picking off the toppings, I put half of the cheese on top of the toppings.

The top cheese was interesting for a few reasons. First, it was not standard practice, so the pizza was not sellable. It did not meet the standard for construction. It was a deviation. Second, the cheese browned in the presence of Pineapple. Normally, if you slop the Pineapple onto a pizza using the standard technique of middle-out building (and clearing out the middle), you get white cheese. Always. The pineapple juice prevents the cheese from bubbling and browning. It is for this reason that Pineapple was not a corporate item, but was optional at the franchise locations.

There are no rules for the crew pie. Not when I make it. This time, everything went just like before. The lul, the pie, the phone, the mini rush, and the drivers in the back room, one folding boxes, the other pissed. There's one slice left on the open pizza box at the end of the counter. Yellow and green under melted cheese, with other good stuff too. Like pepperoni and black olives, with a smattering of mushrooms. Sometimes it's good to break the rules.



* Double Cheese, Triple Pepperoni and Double Salami

Manzano Poppers

This is my most ambitious post so far, and I am applying everything I've told you about blogging to bring you a Recipe Blog. Yes, I have seen so many posts that make me hungry, it's time for my revenge. So, here are my blurry pictures that I shot without a viewfinder, and hyper-fast video clip. Note that the formatting is likey to by rather whacked. I am not an HTML expert yet, so please bear with me as I just use the old editor. Without further ado:

Gas Grilled Manzano Poppers

(um, can I get a larger font?)

Above, you will see a montage of the ingredients we're going to use, except for one. Did I mention that I don't have a viewfinder on the camera? I've played with a number of cheeses, and since it is going to melt, you want one that melts well, and sticks together. It also needs enough taste to tell you "cheese" before, well, you encounter the power of the Manzano. For this, I have chosen Fontinella.

Buried as the backdrop, you can make out the premium center cut bacon. Note, don't get thick cut bacon for this. It won't work well. Get the leanest, oddly shaped, center cut bacon. Short strips are OK, and you're not serving these for the bacon anyway. It's really window-dressing to entice your prey please your guests. It also helps to absorb some of the heat from the pepper. Yes, after cooking, peeling and eating just the bacon will lite your fire.

Ingredients

• One or more Manzano Peppers ($13.99/lb@Vons)
• Premium Center Cut Bacon, Regular Cut (not thick)
• Fontinella Cheese (or multi-cheese melty blend)
• Blue Agave Sweetner (or Honey in a bottle)

Since this is a bacon-wrapped desert appetizer you'll need toothpicks to secure the bacon to itself. I strongly suggest Bamboo Toothpicks. Not because they are environmentally correct, and are not made from trees, but because they work better.

Because they are Bamboo, they slide through the bacon (and into the pepper if need be) without grabbing and tearing like a Birch toothpick will. If you can get Bamboo Toothpicks, do so.

Here are the four peppers that we are going to get prepared and grilled. Each pepper will yield between 2 and 4 poppers, depending on how it is segmented. The pepper in the bottom left corner is triple segmented, having three septa. The rest are double septa peppers. You can tell by shining a bright light into the side wall and looking at the ends of the pepper to see what lights up.

For a three-lobed or tri-septa pepper, the goal is to bisect the septum (split the membrane) on each of the three segments. This, of course, takes three cuts. Here are three horrible photos of the three cuts. Look to the stem to see the angle. Note the depth.

The knife I am using is a 12cm paring knife, and it is very sharp.

For double chamber peppers, cut opposite the septa, to make a pair of halves, and once you can see the septa, split the halves into quarters by splitting the septa.

After the third cut, gently pry the segments apart from the bottom. You will need to make sure that all three cuts intersect at the base of the pepper. This is why it looks a little deep. It is.

And you will get three pieces, that are 90% sealed up, and almost resemble apple slices. This may be one of the reasons that "Manzano" has been translated to "Apple." The hottest part of the pepper is right next to the seeds. Preserve this if, if you're lucky, on the stemmed piece. Remember to give the stemmed pepper to a friend, and try not to blush when you do.

Use the tip of the very sharp knife to both incise into the pockets and to knock the seeds off of the central spire. Take care to hold the pepper by the outer edges. Use Nitrile or Latex gloves (powder free) if you have sensitive skin. Try NOT to touch the septa (membranes) or central pepper stem with your fingers.
Shake the seeds out of the pockets. Save the seeds for someone with a green thumb. Do not give this person a stemmed popper.


Add a small amount of Blue Agave Sweetener, or a slightly smaller amount of honey. This will add an initial sweet taste to the stuffing and prevent any early pepper pungency that can discourage timid guests. Since Manzano Peppers are up to 10 times hotter than a Jalapeno, a little regulation on the heat does not hurt.

I use grated Fontinella, and since it is fresh and sticky, it works very well in the peppers. This pepper does not have a nice septum covering it up, but it will wrap just the same. As long as the outside arc of skin is more than 90 degrees, you can stuff and wrap it. It may not be the most ideal thing, and much cheese may melt, away, but it will never be a waste.

Careful use of the toothpicks will secure the bacon in place. After the bacon starts to cook and fuse together, the toothpick is not as important. However, if you can get it to survive the grilling process, it makes a somewhat safe handle to manipulate the pepper by.

Cook over Medium-Low heat. Do not let flames encroach. After they begin to cook feel free to pour a lite coat of Agave or Honey, or whatever else you'd like to try. Experiment. After turning, coat again. Watch to make sure you don't have flare-ups do to burning sugar. If you do, move the pepper to a safer area. When in doubt, turn the poppers. I do not think you can turn them too much.

The idea is to slowly cook the bacon all the way around. The cheese will melt, don't worry about that. Some will escape. Grab a toothpick and snag the cheese. Even a small drip of cheese will lite up your life. Don't touch your eye. If you do, you are required to post your results here and tell us what happened.



Now, here's my problem. I can smell these things now. So, I have no choice but to spread the torture. For me, I can go make them. I can do them in the dark with an LED flashlight if have have to. I'm feeling a bit lazy. So, to enjoy the torture, just watch the clip below.

Oh yea. Time for a cautionary note. Capsicum Oil will atomize in the steam and smoke in a closed grill. While a closed grill is optimum for cooking Manzano Poppers, it is a pepper spray bomb waiting to be unleashed. Turn your head away from the grill when you open it. This is a mistake you will make only once, and then, your anxiousness will be tempered by the memory of the pain. Consider yourself warned.

I decided that the poppers needed another coat of Agave. They are basically done at this point.

Now, I turn the heat down to low and place a piece of folded foil on the bun-rack. As the poppers complete their cooking (yes, they are all different) onto the sheet they go for storage. It is sometimes necessary to prop one pepper on another to get the right area to cook. Bacon should be properly cooked, and in this case, just this side of crispy.

That's it. I'm done with this post, and I can not stand it any more. I am just happy that I've still got one of these fourteen poppers left. They will keep for a long time in the fridge, and they are fantastic cold, warm, re-heated on the bun warmer the next day, etc.

Just don't use a microwave.