Quad Cities Style Pizza

A few months back Katie and I saw some buzz on Facebook about Quad Cities style pizza getting some national recognition. It was featured on a few slightly larger newspaper sites. A couple of those articles even included recipes for how to make your own at home. This was also of particular interest to Kirk who, since moving to Florida, often craves Harris Pizza, one of the most quintessential QC style pizza joints around. During his last visit to the QC he even bought a bunch a Harris Pizzas, froze them, and brought them back with him to Florida.

Well given Kirk's and my love of Harris pizza and Katie's adventurous culinary spirit, we decided it was worth trying out the recipes to see how close we could get. 

We had to make/mix up the dough more than 24 hrs in advance. 

The secret ingredient was malt that we'd normally use for brewing beer.

Once the dough was ready the next day, Kirk tried his hand at spin/throwing it to get it perfectly circular just like the pros.

I wasn't able to capture the "spinning dough in the air" shot, but you can probably tell by Kirk's laughing that he wasn't very successful. But it was fun to try.

Toppings added. We had one cheese, one sausage, one ground beef and mushroom, and one veggie w/ half ground beef. 

Two of the finished pizzas

The finished products, cut in the traditional QC pizza style way

We then took all the pizzas over to Kirk's family for them to try. It was a hit! We didn't get it exactly right, but it was a lot closer than I expected us to get. The dough/crust was a little too thick, but the flavor was extremely close. I was also impressed with the sauce. It too was close. The one other major change we'd make was that all the pizzas need a lot more cheese to match a true QC style pizza. I think we'll be trying again in the near future.

For those interested in trying it yourself, see below for what we did.

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For the crust and toppings we used this recipe:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/pb/recipes/quad-cities-style-pizza/15158/

For the sauce we used the recipe from here:
http://kwqc.com/2016/02/26/quad-cities-style-pizza-gets-national-exposure/

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Other helpful hints/recipe notes: 

For the crust: 

• Warm water = hot tap water for yeast to prime in
• We used Safale US-04 yeast from the brewing store. They did not Safale US-05, which we would use next time
• We used a dark amber malt from a brewing store. Online chatter about the recipe suggested a dark malt to give proper sweetness to the crust. The dark malt we chose seemed to produce the perfect amount of sweetness, but it did make the crust appear a bit darker than usual Harris pizza. 
• We used regular paprika rather than sweet paprika...the malt seemed sweet enough
• Ice water = really cold water, no ice floating in it

For the toppings: 

• We used the designated amounts of fennel seed and red pepper flakes. It was not too spicy. The fennel seed was better on top of the cheese rather than under it. 
• We made sure the mozzarella was whole milk rather than skim, or at least 2%. We shredded our own from blocks of cheese. 
• In the future we may try a cheese mixture rather than just mozzarella

For the sauce: 

• We just followed the recipe as indicated above. We used generic brands of sauce and paste. It tasted really good. No change needed. 

Triple Chocolate Espresso Cookies

This recipe for triple chocolate espresso cookies was my go-to for our sabbatical travels. Since you melt the butter, mixing by hand is easier and being deprived of a KitchenAid mixer feels slightly more tolerable. These cookies are especially delicious with breakfast because of the slight coffee flavor, but consuming them really any time of the day is acceptable. And, don't let the espresso scare you. People who don't like coffee (like me and Brandon and others) love this recipe too. The cookies have also been acclaimed by an Italian and at one point used to barter for more affordable Airbnb accommodation. 


Ingredients: 

• 12 ounces semi-sweet chocolate chunks or chips, divided (I like Ghirardelli 60% or Trader Joe's chocolate chunks. The quality of chocolate chips you use is important for this recipe.) 
• 1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter (I use half butter and half margarine)
• 1 1/2 cups unbleached all purpose flour
• 1/2 cup cocoa powder
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1/4 tsp baking powder
• 1/4 tsp kosher or sea salt (I use a sprinkling of sea salt) 
• 2 eggs 
• 2/3 cup granulated sugar
• 1/2 cup brown sugar, packed
• 1 Tbsp (or less, to taste) instant espresso powder (I really like the ease of Medaglia d'Oro, but buying instant coffee granules of pretty much any brand and making them finer with a rolling pin and Ziploc bag works too.) 
• 1 tsp pure vanilla 

Instructions: 

1. Heat oven to 235 degrees F
2. In microwave melt half of the chocolate with the butter, stirring frequently to make sure the chocolate doesn't clump and burn. (I usually set the microwave for 20 second increments and stir after each until all is melted)
3. Beat (with mixer or by hand) the sugars, eggs, instant espresso powder, and vanilla until well combined. Mix in the chocolate-butter mixture. 
4. Add flour, cocoa, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. 
5. After mixing the dough will look sticky, like brownie batter. 
6. Drop the batter in whatever size you desire onto prepared cookie sheets
7. Bake for 10-12 minutes or so (usually ends up being 8-10 minutes for me...better underdone than overdone). The cookies are done when the tops are cracked and the edges are set, but the inside should still be pretty moist and fudge-like. 
8. Enjoy for breakfast or pretty much anytime. They're pretty rich tasting, so you'll probably want some milk...or coffee or tea or beer. 

Triple chocolate espresso cookies

Recipe credit: http://food52.com/recipes/11220-triple-chocolate-espresso-cookies

Sweet Potato Black Bean Tacos with Jicama Slaw

Brandon has suggested I add some blog posts featuring some of our favorite, go-to sabbatical recipes. It seems fitting that the first recipe is for tacos.  

Slaw ingredients: 

• 1 small-medium jicama 
• 1/2 red onion
• cilantro to taste
• 1 avocado
• 1 lime (or bottled lime juice, but it doesn't taste as good as fresh lime)

Taco ingredients: 

• 2 medium sweet potatoes, peeled and cubed 
• 1 can black beans, drained
• 2 tsp cumin (or to taste)
• 4 tsp chili powder (or to taste) 
• light sprinkling of salt and black pepper (or to taste) 
• 1 lime (or bottled lime juice)
• feta cheese
• corn tortillas

Jicama slaw instructions: 

1. Cut or peel off the outer skin of the jicama and discard. Cut the remaining jicama into thin strips and put in bowl
2. Slice 1/2 red onion thinly and add to jicama in bowl (we like a 2:1 jicama to onion ratio)
3. Add cilantro leaves to the bowl to taste (we love cilantro, so we usually use at least half a bunch) 
4. Toss all of the above in juice of one lime
5. Cut avocado into chunks/cubes and add to bowl
6. Mix everything together being careful not to mash the avocado too much

Tip: The slaw is best if it sits and marinates a couple hours before serving, but this is not essential


Taco instructions: 

1. Peel and cut sweet potatoes into cubes. Sauté in pan with some olive oil until tender (soft, but not mashed potato soft). 
2. Lower heat and add juice of one lime to sweet potatoes. Season with chili powder, cumin, salt, and black pepper to taste. 
3. Add a can of drained black beans to the sweet potatoes and heat through
4. Warm/toast corn tortillas on a skillet
5. Put sweet potato filling in corn tortilla, topped by feta cheese, and finally jicama slaw
6. Enjoy the delicious combination of flavors as you consume as many tacos as your stomach will tolerate

The finished product: Sweet potato black bean tacos with jicama slaw