Where ya been Dishes?
Sorry guys. I’ve been in my tax cave for the last month – a cave made up of 1040’s, 4868’s, 7004’s and the like. When the Ides of April roll around, then it’s all hands on deck and I end up exhausted at the end of the day. My feet hurt, my brain hurts, and on the weekends all I want to do (when I’m not actually in the office) is slump on the couch and rewatch True Blood. Oh-ho, the glamorous life!
Today’s project is a weird experiment inspired by two people – my sainted brother who has given up all of the most delicious meats, and the receptionist at our office. It was a weird and lovely moment of connection when somehow the subject of zucchini came up and we found out that we agreed that the very best zucchini in the world is at Japanese hibachi grills. It’s an odd thing to agree on, and an odd thing to somehow find out you agree on, but I feel very strong feelings of love for that delicious zucchini. Sorry, but I’m not going to rig up some kind of flat top grill on my bottom-of-the-line electric stove and try to juggle knives over an onion volcano. I’m not saying that couldn’t happen someday, but not today.
And I’m not going to get into any talk about vegetarian, veganism, ethics, or morality. I’ll simply say that, culinarily speaking, it’s limiting. I don’t see it as a challenge to make delicious food without certain ingredients – it just seems like shutting the door on thousands of possibilities, techniques, and learning opportunities. But for some reason I got it in my head yesterday that maybe I could make zucchini taste like pepperoni. You can cut it roughly the same size, and it’s such a neutral flavor that it goes in or with almost everything. Like a potato, you can do just about anything with it and it will take on the flavors around it – Mystique from X-Men-like. I am not a fan of faux-meats either – it’s like if you overlook the taste and texture, you might actually believe you’re eating a burger! Yuck.
Enough digressing – let’s dive in. This gives me a chance to pull out my much-loved/seldom used mandolin slicer, which I get way too excited about and start mandolining every thing in the kitchen. In minutes I have WAY too much zucchini, and the garlic and onions ready for the pot of sugo I’m making just because it’s Sunday. Note: the garlic did not work out well on the mandolin.
I’m still too lazy to actually make a dough, so I’m working with the little pita breads again, and decide on a garlic and olive oil base. Since biting into a slice of garlic isn’t too appealing for anyone but us hardcore garliphiles, I just poach some garlic in half a cup of olive oil until it smells and tastes garlicky.
Then I create the “cure” for my zucchini slices – it’s pretty simple:
½ Teapoon each of:
Salt
Paprika
Galic Powder
Dry Mustard
Red Pepper Flakes
Fennel Seeds
Liquid Smoke
Note: I spent $4 on fennel seeds, only to come home and find two jars already in my cabinet, dammit. But I did get to use my precious and decorative teeny-tiny mortar and pestle to crush them up a little.
Then just add a sprinkle of black pepper and two tablespoons of olive oil. For no reason at all, I use my teeny-tiny whisk to mix it up.
Suh kyoot.
Toss the zucchini slices in with the spice mixture. It’s best to use your hands and rub each side of the disk to make sure they’re completely covered, then lay them in one layer in a bowl and put in the fridge to “cure” for two hours, and let the salt extract some of the moisture.
Two hours later:
Holy shit you guys. It smells like pepperoni. It actually tastes like freaking pepperoni. I mean… Wow. I’m super excited here. Like Dr. Frankenstein thumbing-his-nose-at-God-excited. True, the texture isn’t quite right, but I made a freaking vegan pepperoni. It’s also gluten-free, dairy-free, sugar-free and does not contain nuts. I want to stop here and not even finish the pizza, because – wow. Check me out. (High fives self). It even has that orangey grease! I shall call you “Zuccheroni”. I immediately text my cousin http://harvestandhoney.com/, all my girlfriends, and my sainted brother with the good news.
Since this is the pizza portion of the blog, I’ll continue on. Preheat the oven to 475, and brush the pita with garlic oil. Top as desired – here I use scallions, goat cheese, mozzarella, and of course zuccheroni. Bake 5-10 minutes until the crust is crisp and the cheese is melted. Nom. Nom nom nom.
Maybe not the best pizza I’ve ever had, but I CREATED ZUCCHERONI!!! In the future I’m going to play with this more – maybe oven-drying the disks will help the texture. Maybe dehydrating? There is a whole world of possibilities. I can’t wait.
illdothedisheslater 