Seasonal mark

We generally make a couple of homemade pizzas once a week, usually on Monday night. The variations are driven by our garden, freezer, and pantry and are pretty much endless. Particular favorites are smoked salmon, caramelized onion, and feta or bacon (homemade), basil, and tomato, or bacon and green chile, or Swiss chard (lots, and finely sliced), feta, and black olives with lots of garlic in the sauce. One pizza that gets in the rotation as soon as ingredients are available and that I particularly look forward to is the classic Pizza Margherita. Simple, but, with fresh tomatoes from the garden and fresh basil, perfect in its simplicity. Early last week we had enough tomatoes for our first. Most years, the ingredients are on hand by early or maybe mid-July, but this is an odd year for the garden.





Just for fun, here's a new try- a half and half pizza with oyster mushrooms on one side and cauliflower mushroom on the other. Oyster mushrooms are an old favorite of mine on pizza, but these large wild oysters gave better coverage and a particularly nice flavor. Not the best use of cauliflower mushroom though, as the garlic & cheese combined to overwhelm most of the nuance of its more delicate flavor. Earthy pizza-



The green chile stands are setting up and starting to perfume the air, a sure sign that the season is getting ready to turn. Although fall is always best, I'm not sure I'm quite there yet. I haven't gotten my pizza margherita fix yet.