I heart rebar...

Rebar.

Most don't give it a second thought. That mysterious material that keeps your porch from falling apart, or the nice stuff that keeps you from a watery death when driving over bridges that are much too old to support your stupid SUV that never is either S or U.

I, your not so humble but always purveyor of truth and wisdom (and apparently from a wordcloud analysis, opinions about pizza) have warm and fuzzy feelings about said rebar.

(I like that "Hitler" and "Airlines" are the same size, but kinda sad that "ricotta" is also.)

rebar is pretty cheap, easy to find either from a local big box store (but not Lowes, we don't like them, but that is another story) or from your really nice and lovely neighbor who occasionally leaves a pile of scrap rebar in front of your shop (we LOVE our farm neighbors) when the bridge/dam/evil volcano lair project his company was working on has extra.

Rebar.

easy to find, pretty cheap, not always containing near lethal amounts of Co-60 waste, but I digress. (funny story, I just happened to have later worked at said the "wrong turn" where they found it, coincidence?)

(science)

Despite the incidence of likely permanent sterility (we like sleeping in and not lactating, so not a real deterrent) I still feel jittery when we don't have at least a few hundred feet of rebar nearby for random projects.

{FQ Sidebar: I feel the same way about flour. And coffee. Not hundreds of feet, but an adequate supply. Otherwise, I'm twitchy.}

Rebar (not radioactive flour and coffee) that's what this post is "about", or kinda.

It is not the best for many things, like making knives... or bread, as it is a) whatever scrap happens to be lying about when "those that do" get the hankerin' for makin' rebar (see above link to Co-60) or b) not food.

What it is good for is me making stuff out of it, see reasons above (not the Co-60 paragraph, the one before it, sheesh).

(cicada wing. Cicadas are bugs that come out every few years to make grown men yell "SHUT THE F@<K UP!!!!" out the window at 3am. I think it has something to do with mating, the bugs, not the insane men)

I also like the fact that unlike when I used to bend neon tubes (that was a long time ago in a place far, far away) I can hit it with a big hammer and it falls under the overall general category of "constructive" vs. "quit braking sh!t" see previous post.

(yep, same maul - fancy word for hammer. We be gettin' technical, yo)

When asked about if I make stuff, I like to say "artificial flowers, and stuff", what I usually leave out (so they don't look at me like I yell at bugs at 3am while not mating) is 7ft tall daffodils out of rusty scrap construction material that may or may not make you sterile, but that still is not really an issue considering my almost Dr. Doolittle like rapport with the insect kingdom.

 (this would be tigridia, FQ's favorite flower, I may have yelled at it at one point)

{FQ Sidebar: Not rebar. Tattoo. FQ is so badass, she got a tattoo before Phrodaux.}

(rebar daffodils in their natural environment. About 7ft tall, actually a bit taller as the parking structure said that 7ft was the height limit, and there may have been an "incident")

So in summation.

a) Rebar (mostly) good.
2) Yelling at things-rarely effective.

and most important. we like pizza, but not Hitler.

is that a pepperoni in the sheets or are you just happy to see me?

The history of pizza...

...from the late '90's to bottom 15% completed part of the 21st century in the general geographic location of my 2 to 4 kitchens of that time frame (there may have been dark periods where I didn't make pizza, but we don't speak of those times/kitchens).

This is a tale of woe, elation, tears, laughter, fire, scars, pirates, gun play, and flour (except the pirates and gun play part, those were added to make me feel more exciting... and taller)

I am among the group of people who like pizza, shocking I know. But I'm willing to go to meetings and admit that fact. Speaking of facts, it is common knowledge that everyone, everywhere likes pizza, except Hitler. He didn't like pizza*, but he did have more glaring faults, so we forgive you if you didn't know that.

We are all about the educationalizing here at the blog-o-phrodauxandthefairyqueen.


Pizza. Like pizza, like making pizza, like eating pizza, don't really like pizza shirts or bedding.

(this was available on Amazon for a while, but for some reason it is no longer available... for...some... reason...)

so...

Phrodaux makes pizza. Yes, there were long (very long) periods of Boboli, don't judge. It was a great short cut. Yes, unnecessary, but that was then.

Then (now, or most recently now) home made crust, FQ makes it, Phrodaux tries to keep it frozen despite turning off the freezer whenever we leave the farm (another story). Home roasted tomatoes for sauce. Some home grown, some purchased either from the nice old couple who grow ~200 plants on the small suburban lot and sell them on the porch for $1 a pound except for the 3 1/2 lb one that was too ugly to sell so they just gave it to us or from the oh-so-cute-they-must-be-grown-in-lab teen boys and girls at the farm stand on the way to the farm. (Roasted tomatoes must also be able to stand freezer being turned off whenever we leave the farm, but that is another story, I keep telling you that, pay attention.)

(nope.)

We are on the more simple track. At one point it was sauce that had peanut butter, tomato sauce, an egg, all the usual spices, walnuts, anchovy paste, garlic, basil....

so, Boboli, the sauce, then toppings. Those would be along other things and permutations and combinations of broccoli, potatoes, olives, occasionally whatever leftovers seemed to make sense (salmon hash was particularly good), dried tomatoes (fresh were too wet). Then cheese, mostly just mozzarella, but once in a while whether because of not having enough mozzarella or just 'cause, cheddar and/or some hard cheese like pecorino. Then fresh mushrooms, drizzle with olive oil and fresh ground pepper.

 (really? really? this may be the closest she has come to "food" in days)

cooked 20mins at 400f (convection).

But now I'm working on more simple. Don't get me wrong, it was good, but simple is also pretty good, and nice to work on "perfecting". Also... PIZZA PEEL! The fabulous gift that just showed up on our doorstep one day from the even more fabulous TFtNWKToFaDahYTLUKTCNs (they really need a better code name), changed my fricken life! I loaf mys pizza peel! There is this whole cloth conveyor belt thingy so you don't have to scootch the pizza off onto the stone, and scootch cheese and toppings off the pizza onto the back/bottom of the hot oven. BRILLIANT! If the Nobel committee ever adds at category (it won't be math, as there is some story about Nobel's wife leaving him for a mathematician, but I was told this by a mathematician, and they have imaginary numbers and everything, so take it with a grain of "i") it should be for pizza and whomever made the conveyor belt pizza peel should win a MILLION DOLLARS! or at least an island with a secret evil lair in a false volcano. Just sayin'.

(we may have peaked as a species shortly 

before the invention of "pizza socks")

Now it is mostly home made crust, fairly simple sauce (overnite roasted tomatoes, usual spices, some anchovy paste for umami, cheese and usually some olives on top of the cheese). Drizzle of olive oil and some fresh ground pepper into an oven at least 500f that has been preheating for ~1hr (it does make a difference, we tried less, half an hour is not as good, really) and a pizza stone. Usually 6-10mins is all it takes. End up with nice crispy, chewy crust.

(ok, now I am just confused, Seems like she should be on 

some serious antibiotics at this point, I agree with FQ, not really sure 

where we are 'spose to look.)

{FQ sidebar: ACK I CAN'T STAND THOSE TIGHTS...I holler that every time I get to this part of the post.}

Then we have food. Dinner on Sundays. Pizza and some fabulous salad that FQ whips up at the last minute, after coming into the kitchen saying "am I too late? we need salad!!!"

Someday there will be pictures and maybe more recipe type guidance to the pizza DA-jour, but today there is just odd tights that we don't really approve of.








*-Hitler may have actually enjoyed pizza, but I like to think that he didn't, so you shut up now.