Dinner has been decided upon for this lovely Sunday evening. It’s only supposed to get up to 99 degrees today! It was not decided by me, but instead by my garden. I went out this morning, while it was only 84 degrees, and noticed that if I didn’t do something about the luscious basil going wild and the very tall bay laurel tree in my garden that they would take it over.

I’m thinking about an appetizer of flatbread with basil in the dough, basil oil, and roasted tomatoes with – wait for it… basil pesto! And maybe salmon grilled on top of the bay leaves and lemon slices and also some Yukon gold potatoes braised in stock and more bay leaves.

I’ve had crème brûlée scented with fresh bay leaves, fresh from a bay tree, before, and although it was delicious, I really don’t want to stand over the hot stove in the summer “stirring constantly” (two of my least favorite words!) a steaming custard. After painting that little picture for myself, the crème brûlée is definitely OUT! So something else may be with the bay leaves for dessert – any thoughts out there? I am off to the movies…

……I am thankful no one came up with any dessert ideas because I was actually too busy to even think about dessert today! Dave and I saw Inglorious Basterds early this afternoon and LOVED it! This is from a girl who has to put her hands over her eyes during the icky parts! And there were plenty of icky parts, but I still want to go back and see it again! I’m not a huge Quentin Tarantino fan, I liked Kill Bill(s) and Pulp Fiction but this movie was just so cool, and Brad Pitt… love him even more than before, if that is possible. What about Christoph Waltz? If he isn’t nominated for an Oscar, there is something wrong in the movie biz! Enough about that, this is a “cooking/food blog” so on to the rest of that part of the day…

After the movie and a Costco run, I arrived home at about 3:00 and began making the Grand Basil-Bay Dinner. Good friends, Chris and Kathy Froggatt were to arrive at 6:00, with nice wines in hand! It was a great evening with good friends. They recounted their wonderful vacation cruise to Monaco, Italy, and Greece (ready to go tomorrow after hearing about it all!)

Amidst all the catching up and garden touring, I totally burned (we’ll call it charred!) the flatbread while grilling it. But we enjoyed it anyway because the Bay Leaf Roasted Tomatoes that topped it was still tasty and the Baileyana Chardonnay that Chris brought somehow washed away all thoughts of those nasty carcinogens we were ingesting.

Dinner itself went off much better. We had a fabulous Chasseur Pinot Noir from Sonoma and the bay laurel flavors present in the fish and potatoes were truly sublime. Kathy is not a salmon fan, so I did a “personal-size” piece of halibut for her. I think the individual size is a really nice presentation for a more formal dinner. A bit more work to individually wrap each piece of fish, but it’ll cook faster and it does look fancy!

One last note about the salmon. It is drizzled with olive oil, and any fruity olive oil will do, but I adore our own local Queen Creek Olive Mill Meyer Lemon Olive Oil. It is available locally at A.J.’s or can be ordered online HERE.

And if you are a neighbor or live close enough to drop by, just give me a call if you want to make any of the dishes with the fresh bay leaves. You can have all you’ll need, free for the taking. The salmon recipe uses way too many leaves to purchase at the store in those tiny herb packages when you can actually find it. So don’t be shy, the bay tree grows better when it is pruned, so you’ll be doing me a favor… really!

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Connor is safe and sound and cool in beautiful Flagstaff and I am trying to settle back into my new routine of blogging. As promised here are the pizza recipes from Connor’s “Last Supper” (I know, how dramatic can a mom be?!?) You’ll notice that the dough/crust recipe is the same for all pizzas… that is because this is my favorite and most reliable crust recipe. There are different techniques for each baking, but any and all can be done whichever way you prefer. On Monday night, I baked all pizzas on a stone in a 500-degree oven. When I feel like going outside (I did not on Monday, since it was sweltering outside!) then I prefer to use the grill, directions for grilling pizza can be found in the Barbecue Chicken Pizza recipe below. But until the evenings cool off, you won’t find me out there unless the pool is also involved!

Connor’s California Club Pizza

Dough
1 tablespoon or 1 package dry yeast
2 cups flour, divided
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon milk
1/2 teaspoon salt

2 cups sliced rotisserie chicken breast
2 cups shredded mozzarella cheese
1/3 cup cooked thick bacon, crumbled-about 8 slices
3 cups chopped iceberg lettuce
1 cup chopped romaine lettuce
4 tablespoons mayonnaise
4 large tomatoes, two diced, the other two each sliced into 8 slices
1 avocado, sliced into 16 slices

Dough: In the large bowl of a standing mixer, combine 1/4 cup of lukewarm water, the yeast, and 1/4 cup of flour. Let stand for 20 minutes, this is called the sponge.

Add the remaining 1 3/4 cups flour, 1/2 cup lukewarm water, olive oil, milk, and salt, and mix thoroughly. Turn the dough out onto a floured surface and knead until smooth, elastic, and a little bit tacky to the touch, about 8 minutes.

Place the dough in an oiled bowl and turn the dough over to cover with oil. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap…

and let rise in a warm place until doubled in volume, about 1 hour.

Place a pizza stone in your oven and preheat to 500 degrees.

Divide the dough in half. Form each half into a 10-inch circle on a lightly floured surface.
Place one round of dough onto a pizza pan or a pizza peel that will be used to slide the dough onto the hot pizza stone. Be sure to dust the pizza peel liberally with flour or cornmeal so that the assembled pizza will slide off easily. Bake for 7 to 8 minutes or until crust just begins to brown. Repeat with the remaining half of the dough.

Brush the pizza crust with olive oil. Sprinkle 1 cup of shredded mozzarella on the crust, followed by 1/2 of the crumbled bacon and 1/2 of the chicken. Return to oven until cheese is melted, about 3 minutes. Repeat with remaining crust.

Assemble: Combine the iceberg lettuce with romaine lettuce in a large bowl. Stir in mayonnaise and mix until lettuce is well coated, then gently stir in the diced tomatoes.

Cut each pizza into 8 slices. Top each slice of pizza with a slice of tomato and 1 slice of avocado. Top each with lettuce mixture and serve immediately.

Makes 2 pizzas, 8 slices each

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