Tonight is date night! And while I am still enjoying it, I just couldn’t wait to blog about dinner! I have wanted a Lodge cast iron skillet for ages, but in the many things that I always stuff in my suitcase to bring back to London, I could never truly justify putting a large heavy skillet in my suitcase, since all of my bags are usually marked HEAVY anyway. The skillet is where Mr. Michie drew the line.
My Nana has had her cast iron skillets for over 50 years and they are still beautiful! So, when I saw this gorgeous Lodge skillet at West Elm yesterday, it just jumped into my hands. Now, I broke all of my Southern upbringing rules today, because the first thing I should have been cooking in this pan was either fried chicken or a fresh batch of biscuits. I went to my Italian roots instead and the first thing we made was a cast iron skillet pizza.
It is a recipe I mentioned in my post yesterday. I used my favorite dough recipe from Annie’s Eats, although it isn’t quite her recipe any more. I have made it so many times and have incorporated elements from an Ina Garten recipe I like and some of my bread making techniques.
Mr. Michie made a delicious fresh sauce with wispy strips of basil ribboned through it, while I rolled out the dough. I was in charge of pizza making, he was in charge of pizza cooking. Now, just like the gorgeous Jessica, I don’t own a pizza peel either. So, we improvised, I wasn’t a Girl Scout for nothing!
Once the pizza hit the blazing hot pan, dinner went 1,2,3, literally! In 3 minutes we had dinner and you would have thought that we cooked it in a wood oven grill in our backyard, not in a cast iron skillet under the broiler!
It puffed up, some of the edges charred, the cheese was perfectly melted. We let it set up for a few minutes and then transferred it to our cutting board. Mr. Michie cut it and we couldn’t even wait to get it onto plates before we devoured the first slice. Oh My God! I don’t think we can ever go back to our normal pizza methods ever again! This was fantastico!
On a side note there was a bit of smoke, so while Mr. Michie took care of the pizza, I had the front door ajar and was busily fanning our smoke detector. It was like an “I Love Lucy” episode in here for a few minutes. Also, one section of the pizza stuck to our skillet, so next time I might need to use a bit more flour. I managed to get it all out and after re-seasoning my pan, it looks as good as new.
What a perfect date night. The pizza was so good we never even bothered making the salad or opening the wine. We split a beer, listened to music and ate dinner by candlelight! What could be better?
