Category : A Day In The Life

Well, this is something different to put on my blog.

Okay, a bit of background, I was having a few people over. Decided to make pizza and like they say: Necessity is the mother of invention.

I wanted to offer my guests something different and if I could, make something they had never quite had before. Thus, this pizza was baked. Just as a quick note, I have been baking for quite sometime now so these days I do not measure anything anymore as I just go by sight and taste. As such, I am going to defer to you to do a bit of the same so you can match your tastes. Also, since I ended up making more, not all pizzas were exactly the same but more so to match my guest’s tastes. Also, I am going to try to cut the recipe down to just the one pizza you see above. So let’s jump right into it:

INGREDIENTS

12 X 8 inch metal baking pan

White flour as needed (3 cups)

2 1/4 tsp. of quick-rise yeast

2 1/2 tsp. of sugar

1/2 tsp. of salt

1-2 cups of water, weather/humidity dependant

1 large yellow pepper (or red, not green)

1 bush of kale

1 broccoli stem with florets

2 tomatoes

3-4 already cleaned heads of garlic

3-6 stalks of  cleaned Gai Lan (chinese broccoli)

4 ounces of minced lean grounded pork (more if you want to)

Garlic powder

Tandoori powder or sauce

Yellow curry (powder)

Paprika

Can/bottle of tomato/pasta sauce, 425g+ — Get one with herbs included for extra taste. 😉

Good quality olive oil

Pink Rose Salt

Optional:

Green Onions both the bulb and the stack

Fresh cloves — not dried

2 cups of 50/50 grated cheese, either Old Cheddar, Swiss or Mozzarella, although I hardly ever use Mozzarella. That’s for pizzas I buy when I am out.

Oyster sauce as dipping sauce. Add a few drops of water to mild the saltiness.

DIRECTIONS

Take 2 cups of the white flour into a large mixing bowl, make a doughnut, thus you can see the bowl in the middle and in it add the 2 1/4 tsp. of quick-rise yeast, 2 1/2 tsp. of sugar, 1/2 tsp. of salt 1/2 cups of water and mix. You want a consistency where all the water is absorbed and the flour is NOT sticky but a touch bouncy. If you press your thumb on it and if you can see the exact indentation, then you have used too much flour. Add water or flour as needed to get this consistency while you continue to mix. Once achieved, knead for 10 minutes, and lightly coat with flour if it is still too sticky. Put aside and very gently brush oil on the dough as to not let it dry, cover bowl and work on the veggies.

Chop your veggies as per taste. Take your tomato sauce, which for the pizza above I used between 1/3 – 1/2 of the bottle/can  and mix with yellow curry to taste. Remember that curry goes a long way so you do not have to use a lot and you just want a hint of it. Put aside.

Take your pork and mix in the paprika and tandoori to taste as well. The same as above goes for the tandoori, you do not need too much. Once the pork is evenly marinated, put aside. You can either quickly sear it for a few seconds on a hot pan before putting on the pizza or you can put it raw, trust me, either way, it will be fine.

Evenly yet lightly, oil your baking pan, take the dough which should have risen a bit and knead it for an extra 2 minutes. For an extra crispy pizza add one extra 1-2 tsp. of extra olive oil on the pan, disperse evenly. Flatten your dough on pan, add your sauce, a touch of pink salt and powdered garlic to taste followed by the cheese on top. Add all your veggies and sprinkle the pork, in tiny bits as the top layer.

Quick note: If you want your veggies to be more crisp, then layer your veggies from heaviest to lightest, weight-wise. If you want otherwise, reverse the order.

Preheat up your oven to 425F and place your pizza in. If you want crispy, leave in for 20+ minutes. For a bit softer, then for about 17+. Don’t worry about the pork, if you sprinkled as mentioned, due to its small individual size, it will cook through.

Take out, cover for 5 minutes with a cloth, take out of the pan, serve and ENJOY!

Let me know how it goes!

So the night came! Wednesday the 26th, it was a nice bright day and I had the chance to throw a reception displaying my photography. It was a wonderful time to show photos from my latest collection and to have a bit fun while at it. The current collection, Projecto Italia focuses on the historical and everyday life of Italy, as its citizen weave in and out of monuments everyday which have lasted, standing tall for centuries, bearing witness to the endless cycle of societies come and go within Italy.

However, you can’t stay still, hence I am working on my new exhibit, Projecto Toronto!

Nevertheless, it was a great reason to get together, toast, sell a few pieces of art and make a lot of new friends, not to mention chat with a few old faces I had not seen in a while.

Mario Munoz was our live entertainment and wowed the crowd with his classical guitar. His music resonated well, not only with the energy of the event but also acoustically. The man knows his strings. Expect to see him again in one of my future events and thank you, Reggie and Emilie for the help with the photography and earnest video. I have always been really bad at keeping records of things like this for myself due to some silly notion of modesty, which can at times such as this, be nothing but detrimental.

Being able to share my work is a pleasure and I am very thankful to all of you who came out to support and shared a drink with me.

I was excited! Every time I have a chance to display my work publicly is something not to take lightly. First, because it is a pleasure to share an evening of photography when it comes to the reception night. Second, it is a lot of work to do behind the scenes and lastly, as an event organizer, I push myself to make sure everyone has an amazing, enjoyable evening. That last part is probably the one resonating the most as these days an artist/photographer/event manager/marketer has to wear a few more hats than just one and do each of them well in order to guarantee a possible outcome.

I set myself to find a venue which I thought had a great cool factor, good service and showed itself to be a great canvas to display my work. Eventually I picked Insomnia Cafe as it has a very attractive aesthetic and I have always known for them to be very supportive of local artist.

After we had reach an agreement and a date set for the reception, then, and only then, is when the real work begins. As part of the contract, they would be hosting a number of my works for display for the month of July. A quick cab ride there and I was ready to move to the next steps. Which was marketing and entertainment. I wanted to add an element of music to for it and began looking for possible acts. Originally I thought about using an amazing violin quartet called Devah Quartet I had used in my last Halloween Grandiversity party. However I suspected there might be scalability issues plus I wanted to go with something a little more subdued to better mix with the venue. I remember hearing this Latin Jazz guitarist through my adventures with the Indie Coffee Passport earlier in the year and I set upon myself to find him. In the mean time I began marketing through social media and using my own mailing lists.

Through some social media sleuthing and asking around, I was able to easily find Mario Munoz and after some phone tagging,  we were able to work out for him to perform some of his original work during the reception! After a few calls to Insomnia Lounge regarding the logistics of some live guitar.  We were off to the races!

One of the most interesting, rewarding things an artist can ever do is to display his or her work. Of course, nothing but I mean nothing will ever take away from the cheer act of creating. It is after all the very drive of creating what makes us do what we do.

However being able to share the fruits of our labour with others, with the world can and should be an enjoyable, humbling and educational experience. This is the very reason why I wanted to have another opportunity to do so… and to serve as an excuse to meet friends, family and new faces alike. Who am I to say ‘no’ to a welcoming excuse for a toast?

Projecto Italia is a photography collection driven by a love of Italian architecture, its history and unique panoramas. A modern country still strongly rooted in an old world cradle that are it’s buildings, towns, monuments and values. I was inspired to go there, as it happens sometimes in life, by the dreams of someone else. After hearing her stories and being swept by her passionate enthusiasm, I felt compelled to travel 7000 kilometres and attempt to capture some of those very moments through my lenses. It was a great experience.

From the symmetry of the spiral stairs of the Vatican, immense tombs in Florence or the nostalgic canals of Venice, please join me at Insomnia Lounge for Projecto Italia: A Photography Reception. Select pieces from Project Italia will be on display at the front lounge on Wednesday, 7:30pm, July 24th, 2013.

Hope to see you there!