On the third day the pizza dough I halved, slathered with meat sauce, dotted with cheese, sprinkled with dried chili flakes, strewed with bean sprouts, topped with shrimp, drizzled with garlic-infused oil, sprinkled with sea salt and more pepper (black), baked in a cast-iron skillet, and garnished with baby basil.
Boys and girls, it was one superb pizza. Light yet flavorful and filling, it qualified as a personal best. I had stretched the dough as thin as I could and it came out chewy and crunchy in turns (not crispy like Greenwich’s, which I do not fancy). I could have eaten the bread as is. Less really is more.
I confess that bean sprouts were the last ingredient I had in mind to put on top of pizza, but we had some in stock, so why not? Better there than in the trash (they looked like they were on their last legs). My gripe with bean sprouts sold at the wet market is that they are a bitch to prepare. Never mind that they look nothing like their supermarket counterparts; I hear you need chemicals like urea and sodium nitrite (a carcinogenic) to make them get to that size and look that good. (Don’t you just love them Chinese? If they don’t kill you with shabu, there’s always cadmium rice, rat “mutton,” gutter oil — and bean sprouts. At least I don’t drink milk.)
I had considered blanching the sprouts first, but it seemed like too much work so I added them as is. They contributed an extra layer of crunch to the pizza. I did regret not putting in more shrimp; that particular portion looked downright niggardly. The cheese, too. That was from looking at pictures of the dish later. Face to face with the real deal, I had no such reservations.
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