Smoked Mushroom, Tomato, & Onion Pizza

Another Staycation meal that we had the luxury of time to produce:



Smoked mushrooms=big revelation. They are so delicious & meaty. I've described it before, but we basically smoke everything we put on the grill due to the fact that Mark has filled a disposable pan with smoke chips. Put a lid on it, poke holes in the top, & you're ready to smoke whatever you're cooking on the grill. It creates delicious results.

These mushrooms especially benefited from that cooking process. They absorbed all of that smoke, making them taste extra meaty.

Is it just me or does this blog seem kinda dirty? I don't know, I think it might be the slightly dirty birthday card I got from my sister-in-law earlier. Man, she's funny. Made my whole day.

Anyway, pizza is a serious issue in my house. After a couple of botched jobs, I nearly revoked Mark's pizza-making privileges. Turns out, he was using yeast that had died.

So...you can find several ways to test your yeast online. Make sure it's still alive, y'all. Otherwise, don't waste your toppings. & these toppings were primo.

We seasoned the mushrooms (creminis) with salt, pepper, and olive oil. We did the same to some sliced heirloom tomatoes.




We also made a packet of chopped onions wrapped in aluminum foil. They were cooked on the grill as well.

And, as it was Staycation, we splurged on some extra cheeses at Trader Joe's.



That's romano, fontina, & some really nice parm (in addition to the mozz, of course). We rationalized that we weren't spending money on a trip, so why not spend it on cheese? I'm serious with the cheese, y'all. When we were DINKS (double income, no kids), I spent $40 a week on cheese at Whole Foods. If we're ever flush with extra money in the future, God help me, the surplus will go toward cheese. It's the finest luxury.



This coming from a girl who hated cheese growing up. I'd actually make my mama order pizza without cheese. Oh, how the mighty fall. I started dabbling in college & as the story often goes, now I can't stop at "pizza" cheese.

The crust of this pizza was really good. We used this well-articulated recipe from one of my favorite blogs.

The sauce was my homemade marinara, made loosely from this recipe.

I make big batches of this stuff using the big cans of tomatoes from Sam's. That's another post entirely, folks.

Mark likes to paint on his Staycation. It's become a yearly thing.