Day 1: Homemade Pizza

I've spent the last week trying to decide what kind of motivation I could have to write a blog.  I don't have any sad circumstances that need personal reflection.  I didn't just move to Alaska like my sister. And I didn't just give birth to an adorable little boy like my dear friend, Naomi.  No, I have done none of those things.  However, that doesn't mean that I have nothing to share with the world...or random bored people who read blogs for fun.  It just means that I had to think a little harder on how I could motivate myself to keep up with a blog.

Yesterday's accomplishment of making an entire pizza from scratch gave me an idea.  I could try to do something new everyday and write about it.  Not only would this give me the chance to work on and keep up my writing skills, but it would help me do new things.  And since I am apparently on a perpetual job hunt, finding new things I'm good at will only come in handy. So, since I was so proud of yesterday's new thing, I decided to go back in time to start this blog:

Yesterday I made a pizza completely from scratch.  This included making the dough, tomato sauce and toppings.  As I've never ever ever made dough of any sort (besides cookie, of course) I was nervous.  The recipe (from The America's Test Kitchen Healthy Family Cookbook) told me to use a food processor--which I do not have--to mix the dough. Therefore I had to research the outcome of what would happen if I used my stand mixer instead.  I found that it shouldn't cause any problems...and it didn't.  The dough turned out great, though I had to resist throwing it around in the air as I was rolling it out. That would've only ended in disaster and a lack of pizza.  I decided on Italian sausage, lots of mozzarella, and onions for toppings as that was all I had around at the time. It all turned out deliciously.

What I learned from making my own pizza:
1) Get a new recipe for pizza sauce (this one was not my favorite)
2) Have a samurai sword or javelin on hand to pop those crazy dough bubbles before it's too late
3) Lock my half of the pizza away somewhere safe so my husband doesn't eat them

As for today's something new, it was obviously creating this blog.  I'm not sure I'm ready to reflect on this yet as I'm just getting the hang of it.  It took me about 30 minutes to get my picture from Cinque Terra, Italy to be the proper background file size.  Other than that, things are going smoothly.

As a final note, I would like ideas on new things I could try.  Please email/call/comment with your thoughts on the matter.  The list so far will only get me through a week so I need your help!  Until tomorrow...