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Recipe: barbecue chicken pizza

If you haven’t entered to win a Colorado care package yet, you have until the end of the day (midnight) this Friday, September 28, 2012. GO ENTER!!

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Autumn in Colorado is psycho. I mean this in a good way. You get those sunny days that are still warm (nay, hot) and dry. They can be sporadically intermingled with storm tracks that rain down and turn everything underfoot to mud, but leave a powdered sugar dusting of snow on the high peaks. If you are lucky, you might manage a photograph of the leaves turning colors and the mountains brushed in broad strokes of white. That is magic combo meal #1. Toss in a dramatic sunset and you have magic combo meal #2. Aw heck, and if you can combine all of that with FURRY BABY ANIMALS then you’ve pretty much got the holy grail right there. I’m only half kidding.

It’s not uncommon for me to encounter autumn storms while on the fall shoot. We like to think of them as early winter storms – sometimes snowing as much as two feet on the last day of summer! This year there has been a lot of rain and fog and clouds. That can be a bummer when the fog is so thick you can’t see anything or it’s pissing rain so hard that you don’t dare take your camera gear out of your pack. I usually rejoice at the rain and the snow. Bluebird skies and sunny days make for fine photographs, but the onset or clearing of a storm adds a different dimension to a capture.

you can’t have rainbows without rain (mt. crested butte at sunset)

I’ve been all up in my head this week because I’m driving around the mountains alone, assessing the weather every two minutes, and constantly scoping out the trees and the mountains. I was excited when I read rain in the forecast, because it meant snow up high. I got less excited when that soaking rain extended for several days. I started to wonder if it would ever let up.

this kinda sucked (iphone)

Frustrating as the rain can be, it pays to be vigilant and ever hopeful. Otherwise you could miss things if you decided to duck into a café and fritter away the time.

like a hot air balloon

or a cute gate to a ranch

or lovely sunset #1

and lovely sunset #2

So I’m glad I stuck it out, ignoring all the reasons telling me to just pack it up and go home where Jeremy and Kaweah are, where I have a nice comfy bed, where I get regular exercise, and where I eat proper food and have access to my kitchen. As you can imagine, posting a recipe just makes me want to get back to real cooking!

leftover barbecue chicken?

I know it’s hard to imagine having leftover barbecue anything, but it can happen if you make double or triple batches! We generally plow through this barbecue chicken recipe, but I set a few aside to make some pizza the other day.

roughly chopped

pizza time! pizza dough, barbecue chicken, mozzarella, barbecue sauce, red onions, fresh cilantro

The first time I had a barbecue chicken pizza was probably at California Pizza Kitchen in the late 80s in southern California. Talk about back in the day… Now, we tend to make our own pizza at home because they are easy and really quite good. Pizza is flexible like a sandwich – put whatever you fancy on the pizza and omit whatever you dislike. I tried to keep it simple with barbecue sauce, barbecue chicken, mozzarella, red onions, and cilantro. Tempting as it may be to load your pizza full of goodies, a little restraint will result in a better pizza. For reals.

spread barbecue sauce on the dough

cheese, chicken…

ready to go (i recommend adding the cilantro after the pizza is done cooking)

**Jump for more butter**

Recipe: chinese char siu bao (barbecue pork buns)

Fork. Stick it to me. I am done. Done with the frenzied holiday baking schedule! And just in case you might be racking your brain for a few ideas, I wanted to share some of the other items we tucked into the gift bags for Jeremy’s wonderful staff. Supporting local businesses is pretty easy if you live in Boulder. We make a point of going to Savory Spice Shop on Pearl Street for creative and beautiful gifts. This store is perfect if you are looking for a variety of little items which you can taste to help you decide. They have something to suit cooks, non-cooks, and unknowns. You can also mail-order from them.

cute little jars of two kinds of cheese sprinkles

Just a few blocks east, we stopped by Atlas Purveyors so Jeremy could grab a latte (shopping makes him drowsy like… instantly) and pick a loose tea from their impressive selection. He went with the Carrington Blend of black tea, lemongrass, orange peel, eucalyptus, and wildflowers.

citrus and floral

Of course, we had to drop a mini bar of Chocolove into each bag. They’re local, make terrific chocolates, have love poems inside the wrappers, and are all around Boulderlicious.

A few weeks ago I made a double batch of char siu pork and I’m sure some of you knew where that double batch was headed (I mean, besides mah belleh). I love char siu pork, but what I really, truly, deeply love are the steamed Chinese barbecue pork buns, char siu bao.

the revered bao

I made one filling, but tried two different doughs because I didn’t care for the first dough. The first dough was cakey and sweeter than I’m used to, although it could very well be my elevation. The second dough was spot on to what I was looking for – a yeast-based dough that is delicate, elastic, fluffy, and less sweet. Let’s start with the filling.

it’s a lot of stuff, but comes together lickity split

dice the char siu pork

everything diced, measured, and ready to go

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Recipe: chinese barbecue char siu pork

H’okay! I can now stand and sit for longer than 15 minutes at a time without breaking into a cold sweat and THAT my friends, is a GREAT feeling. I’ve been watching the snow falling outside our house all week long and I just keep telling myself that it’s laying down a good base for the rest of the season. Not being able to stand or sit for long also means I’m now well behind in just about EVERYTHING I had planned this month. However, being forced to stay inside means that I actually read the user’s manual when this arrived in the mail.

nikon 1 v1

just a little bigger than the iphone

We’re still getting to know each other, but it’s a nice addition to my Nikon family. I think I’ll call it Baby Bear. I’m kidding – I don’t name my cameras. This one will get a lot of miles in the backcountry and on the slopes this winter and spring (and hopefully summer too). I can’t get over how small it is and how well it performs so far…

test shot on the v1

test shot on the d3x

snowy boulder (v1)

Before my back went to hell in a handbasket, I had tested out a recipe that is a childhood favorite of mine. It’s Chinese and it’s pork, so yeah – that makes complete sense. Char siu pork or Chinese barbecue pork was this special treat you could get at the good Chinese restaurants back in the day. They would serve it sliced with the cold appetizer plate or more commonly we’d have it in the barbecue pork steamed buns at dim sum. My sister and I used to fight over these, we loved them so much. She usually won.

five spice, white pepper, garlic, honey, hoisin sauce, soy sauce, sesame oil, shaoxing wine, oil, pork

heat honey, hoisin, soy sauce, shaoxing wine, spices, and sesame oil together

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