Tranquil Epicure

Week 22: VegeQ

If summer had one defining scent, it’d definitely be the smell of barbeque. Katie Lee As a lifelong vegetarian and longtime vegan, barbeque has not been a part of my life. In researching creative pizza ideas for this blog, I kept seeing recipes that involved BBQ sauce, so I decided to try it. I foundContinue reading “Week 22: VegeQ”

Week 21: Creative Calzoni

Mushrooms can be very fancy. It’s the closest you can get to eating dirt. Tom Colicchio Realizing we are almost at the halfway point in our pizza journey (and in this crazy year!) we wanted to try something new. There’s a vegan restaurant we love a few hours from our home that serves an amazingContinue reading “Week 21: Creative Calzoni”

Week 20: Viva la Mexico!

So how as a nation can we sit around and eat Mexican food, and drink beer and make friends? That’s the question. If we can do that on a broader scale, I think we’ll come out of it all right. Sandra Day O’Connor For the next 7 weeks I am in a class on FridayContinue reading “Week 20: Viva la Mexico!”

Week 19: It’s All Greek to Me

“…like that star of the waning summer who beyond all stars rises bathed in the ocean stream to glitter in brilliance.” Homer, The Iliad This week’s pizza was created to honor a new course of study I am embarking on next month. I’ve had a lifelong interest in astrology. Over the years I’ve picked upContinue reading “Week 19: It’s All Greek to Me”

Week 18: Simplicity

Pizza is really simple, but we insist on making it complicated. Confucius (translation inexact) Sometimes in life simplicity is needed. As much as we wanted to use the space of this blog to try creative vegan pizza recipes, who knew that Covid-19 would come along and change the way we buy food? I used toContinue reading “Week 18: Simplicity”

Week 17: Green is Good

Green is the prime color of the world, and that from which its loveliness arises. Pedro Calderon de la Barca When shelter-in-place began we put our names on a waitlist for a local produce delivery service. This week we got our first box of Imperfect Produce. Inspired by our bounty, we decided to make aContinue reading “Week 17: Green is Good”

Week 16: Bud of a Thistle

Okey dokey artichokey. ~ Graunya Holsen When I first moved to California, I lived at a retreat center in Watsonville. It’s a short drive to the very cool beach town of Santa Cruz and near a large farming community that stretches south and east. Garlic, avocados, and artichokes are among the most popular crops grownContinue reading “Week 16: Bud of a Thistle”

Week 15: Something (Almost) Blue

Culinary tradition is not always based on fact. Sometimes it’s based on history, on habits that come out of a time when kitchens were fueled by charcoal. – Alton Brown We started this blog because we love Italian food, especially pizza. A few weeks before the start of this year, I picked up a pre-made cornContinue reading “Week 15: Something (Almost) Blue”

Week 14: Something Borrowed

Nothing is original. Steal from anywhere that resonates with inspiration or fuels your imagination. – Jim Jarmusch We wanted to try a premade, store-bought pizza dough one week to see if it’s superior to the dough we’ve been making at home. Our local grocery stores and online retailers are all out of flour right now,Continue reading “Week 14: Something Borrowed”

Week 13: Something New

Ask not what you can do for your country. Ask what kind of pizza is for lunch. — Orson Welles This week we wanted to try something radically new. We’re also sheltering in place so making just one quick trip to the grocery store each week. That limits our supply of fresh veggies and otherContinue reading “Week 13: Something New”