Friday Night Pizza(from Hell)

OK, so poor old me is left here in the US as all the rest enjoy a Swedish holiday.
We have a living thing in our frig....a "starter". It has to be fed to be kept alive muuuhhaaaaahahahahahah. It's Aliiiivvvvveeee! So you take it out and feed it. I'm all alone so I have to feed it by myself. No problem right? Riiiiggghhhht. I take it out and separate it and feed it, no problem, I have detailed instructions left by LS. She makes the most detailed instrustions, she is a scientist right? OK, no problem, its out overnight RISING. In the morning all is well, it looks just like when LS makes it. OK morning comes, a quick check assures all is well. I place the starter on my lunch bag so I remember to put it in the frig when I leave for work. After eating breakfast and showering I go downstairs to leave. Duh da duuuuhhhh. The starter has fallen off my lunch bag and spilled all over, lots on my bag and it's strap and much on the counter and more dripping on the floor. I clean up the best I can and leave.

Upon returing home, late because I had to get pizza ingredients, I look at the dough I left out for tonights pizza. Looks OK, but not any different than it did this morning, it rose but not at all as much as LS's does. I turn on the oven and get the dough out, flour the table surface to roll it out. I divide the dough in about 1/2, thinking I will freeze 1/2. I start to roll it out. I have way too little it is immediately apparent. So I go back to the freezer and get some more. I roll it out to about maybe 1/2 the size I need and try to pick it up to turn it to roll it more evenly. The part I pick up comes away crumbling in my fingertips. I'm left holing a piece of dough about the size of a fingertip. Did I mention I have never liked dough much?

OK so I add more flour and roll it out, I'm praying I can roll it and then somehow pick it up to place it on the stone. OK, so I'm rolling it out. LS does this and winds up with something close to a circle. I have what looks more like a cross between a circle and a circle that a stone drunk person would do when asked to walk in a circle. Well it will be OK I tell myself, it will just be uneven. I still don't know how I will get it up off the table and on the stone. I try to do the thing LS does, that I have seen, she rolls it up on the rolling pin and then "unrolls" it right on the stone. Well, well, well, I get it rolled on to the pin no problem and I'm feeling pretty smug. I take it over to the stone and unroll it on the stone. No art teacher could have ever done a better job of making a pile of folded fabric on a disc for a student to draw! I struggle to pull it flat and I do. Now it has several big gaping holes in it and pieces dripping off the sides and the stone is so hot it is aldeady cooking.

I take the pieces hanging off the sides and pull them off and place them on the holes burning all my fingertips in the process. I add the tomato sauce, the basil leaves and the cheese. Except for the fact that parts of my dough are falling off the edge of the stone and other areas of the stone are left like big dry deserts things seem to be like any other Friday night. Time for a glass of wine.

I time it for 8 minuteas as LS does. I look in...not done enough. 2 Mins more and I think it still needs more time. OK another minute does the trick, I take it out and try to cut it. LS has this crazy method that I don't approve of, at least not conceptually, she uses scissors! So I get the scissors and while I have seen this done dozens of times and it looks to be no problem. I mean everyone uses scissors right? I try to cut it on the burning hot stone, and proceed to get burned and have the pizza fall off the edge of the stone. I finally get it cut which is no small task in just deciding where to cut it; as it's shape is so amphorus as it's hard to know where to cut it to get even size pieces.

I do get it cut up and pit a piece put on my plate. After all this I get my place in the sun as (thru no fault of my own) I achieve a goal in pizza making, the slice, when held by the outer edge only stands straight out, and does not droop!

And it tasted just as good as when LS makes it! I'm just not doing it again. By myself. And I forget to put on the olives I bought for it.

But it WAS good!