The weekend update.

[mellymell]

Early evening Friday, I get a call from Steff asking if this weekend or next would be better for a visit. It was pretty much six one half dozen the other (as my dad would say), so I left the decision up to her. After a lot of indecision and several calls later, Chris finally said, "tell her to get in the car and we'll have dinner ready when she gets here." And so she did. And we didn't have dinner ready. However, I had been making pizza dough when she called the first time and that was pretty much ready. And Chris had the great idea to grill the pizzas that night, so it was really just a matter of cooking when we were ready to eat.

We spent the two hours or so it takes her to get here doing a whirlwind job of cleaning the house. The office is now amazingly spotless. However, the closet is stacked back up with the boxes and while I carried at least 6 empty ones to the garage, there are still more I'd like to get rid of and/or consolidate. But, this time, I think I'll pull them out one by one and rearrange as I'm able in there, until I feel like I've been through everything. There are a few boxes that wound up in our bedroom closet as well, and that's the next one I have my sights on. However, this week, the focus will be on Jonah's closet so I can get his clothes prepped for the consignment sale this weekend. But I digress.

So, she got here, and we had gotten almost everything cleaned. The house smelled like Pledge, vinegar and bleach. *coughgagcough* We chatted a bit, worked on getting dinner put together and then hung out on the patio while Chris grilled the pizzas and the kids played in the dark back yard. We had dinner and let the kids go inside to watch cartoons while we chatted. They stayed up until after 10pm and then we all were ready to go to bed I think.

We got up the next morning and had leftover dark chocolate raspberry muffins and some really good zucchini bread that Steff had brought. Then, we went to the pool and stayed the longest I've stayed there at once (about 2.5 hours). Chris stayed home and mowed the grass and worked on this SqueezeCenter cell phone app he's been working on lately. We went home and made some chicken salad for lunch then let the kids rest for a bit. When they got up, we made burgers for dinner (hot dogs for the kids) and hung out late watching movies and drinking beer.

And Sunday morning, we dragged ourselves out of bed after only about 4 hours of sleep and way too much beer and Chris made sausage gravy and biscuits and I did some scrambled eggs. Steff had promised one more trip to the pool for Lilly and so we all went back up there for about an hour or so. I actually felt a lot better after being in the pool for a while. But still, found myself dosing on the couch a few times that afternoon/evening. Jonah took a great nap, luckily. Steff and Lilly left late in the afternoon. Then Chris and I had leftover grilled pizza (what was left from Friday night and some fresh stuff he made with leftover dough). The grilled pizzas really were a fantastic change from our typical oven pizza. They'd be a great thing to do for a lot of people too. You can cook two at a time and they're pretty fast to cook. You can't do a lot of toppings on them either. We just did the standard tomato slices, fresh basil and mozzarella. We put Jonah to bed that night and then promptly went to bed ourselves.

And that was pretty much our weekend. Hanging out, drinking beer, eating good food, swimming and not sleeping enough. Exhausting but fun. The kids had a blast together I think. I know Jonah has been talking about Steffany and Lilly in his pretend playing since they left. The house is now mostly put back together, so back to the routine, I guess.

So, that's the news and I. . . am. . . outta here! ;)

Comments

[oropher-777.livejournal.com]

Pizzas on the grill ... intriguing!

When we lived in France, pizzas were cooked in an enclosed, wood-burning oven, usually outside, and they would put dried thyme or rosemary branches in while the cooking was done. How do you grill pizza? Do you use a pizza stone or pan? What is your dough recipe? Because I have a hankering for pizza myself tonight, and I'd love to try something different!

[mellymell.livejournal.com]

Yep, you roll the dough out pretty thin (and not too big, best to do personal sized pizzas no bigger than 12" or so). Brush them with olive oil, then just put it on the grill, directly on the grates. No pan, no stone, no nothing. Once one side of the dough is cooked, you flip it over, top it, cook 'til the bottom is crisp and cheese is melted and then you're done. They come out very much like wood fire oven pizzas. Thin, crispy crust. The thyme or rosemary sounds awesome! Will have to try that sometime. Oh, and keep a knife handy in case bubbles arise in the dough that need to be popped (only a problem when cooking the first side).

Dough recipe, well, it's kind of unreliable because we still don't weigh the flour. I mean unreliable to give to other people anyway. You know how when you've made something for years and you just know what consistency it should be? Well, that's how it is for our dough recipe. But here's our basic guidelines:
1.75 cups warm water
tablespoon yeast (we use bread machine yeast just because it's the only one that comes in jars instead of packets)
2 tablespoons honey or sugar
Let the above proof until foamy, then add. . .
.25 cup olive oil
1 tablespoon salt
5-6 cups flour, incorporating each cup before adding the next one.
If you've got a stand mixer with a dough hook, that's ideal. Once all the flour is in there, I just let it knead in the mixer for 30+ minutes or so. Then, I get the dough into a nice ball and oil a bowl and let it sit with a clean towel over it in a warm place for about an hour to rise. The longer you have for it to rise, I think the better it turns out. The dough always seems to be better the second day.

[oropher-777.livejournal.com]

Oh, thank you!!!! Hopefully I'll have time to try that tonight!