Let’s Celebrate!

MAN, I love pizza. I’m eating one right now…with my KHT peeps. A pizza party is always a great time. Young and old. Can’t get enough. And for me, the more toppings the better!!!!  :)))))))  The only draw back is when there is the dreaded last piece in the box. I’m always there to clean-up and I always offer Jackie the last piece. What a guy. 

Today is National Pizza Party Day, and we’re celebrating here at KHT. Now, of all the wonderful food out there, one of my favorites is pizza.  Sometimes it’s the just the perfect meal – quick lunch, savory dinner with leafy chef salad, complimented by a fine wine, a quick snack when I’m doing a project, and of course, cold from the fridge the morning after.  And there are not many pizza toppings I pass on (still not sure on this little fishy things), so when someone orders “their” favorites, I usually just jump right in.  Like most popular foods, the debate rages on as to what’s best – thin crust, big fat crust, light toppings, piled high toppings, white cheese, yellow blends, and “who’s got the best sauce” – I love ‘em all.  (and how would you like to try and find “the best” – talk about a PIA (Pain in the @%$) Job!) Lately I’ve been enjoying simple pizza – light tangy sauce, cheese, oil and basil – love it when the basil is fresh.  I did some digging and found some fun history I think you’ll enjoy.  Thanks to Wikipedia.com, firstpizza.com, pizzeriaunodue.com, pizzaneed.com, bbc.co, and restaurantclicks.com for the info.

  1. Pizza is the world’s favorite fast food. We eat it everywhere – at home, in restaurants, on street corners. Some four plus billion pizzas are sold each year in the United States alone (an average of 48 slices (about six pizzas) per person!). But the story of how the humble pizza came to enjoy such global dominance reveals much about the history of migration, economics, and technological change.
  2. People have been eating pizza, in one form or another, for centuries. As far back as antiquity, pieces of flatbread, topped with savories, served as a simple and tasty meal for those who could not afford plates, or who were on the go.
  3. In Sardinia, French and Italian archaeologists have found bread baked over 7,000 years ago. According to Philippe Marinval, the local islanders leavened this bread. Foods similar to pizza have been made since antiquity. Records of people adding other ingredients to bread to make it more flavorful can be found throughout ancient history.
  4. In the 6th century BC, Persian soldiers serving under Darius the Great baked flatbreads with cheese and dates on top of their battle shields. And in Ancient Greece, citizens made a flat bread called plakous (πλακοῦς, gen. πλακοῦντος – plakountos) which was flavored with toppings like herbs, onion, cheese and garlic.
  5. These early pizzas appear in Virgil’s Aeneid. Shortly after arriving in Latium, Aeneas and his crew sat down beneath a tree and laid out ‘thin wheaten cakes as platters for their meal’. They then scattered them with mushrooms and herbs they had found in the woods and guzzled them down, crust and all, prompting Aeneas’ son Ascanius to exclaim: “Look! We’ve even eaten our plates!”
  6. But it was in late 18th-century Naples that the pizza as we now know it came into being. Under the Bourbon kings, Naples had become one of the largest cities in Europe – and it was growing fast. Fueled by overseas trade and a steady influx of peasants from the countryside, its population ballooned from 200,000 in 1700 to 399,000 in 1748. As the urban economy struggled to keep pace, an ever-greater number of the city’s inhabitants fell into poverty. The most abject of these were known as lazzaroni, because their ragged appearance resembled that of Lazarus. Numbering around 50,000 they scraped by on the pittance they earned as porters, messengers or casual laborers.
  7. Always rushing about in search of work, they needed food that was cheap and easy to eat. Pizzas met this need. Sold not in shops, but by street vendors carrying huge boxes under their arms, they would be cut to meet the customer’s budget or appetite. As Alexandre Dumas noted in Le Corricolo (1843), a two liard slice would make a good breakfast, while two sous would buy a pizza large enough for a whole family. None of them were terribly complicated. Though similar in some respects to Virgil’s flatbreads, they were now defined by inexpensive, easy-to-find ingredients with plenty of flavor. The simplest were topped with nothing more than garlic, lard and salt Now that’s healthy!). But others included caciocavallo (a cheese made from horse’s milk), cecenielli (whitebait) or basil. Some even had tomatoes on top. Only recently introduced from the Americas, these were still a curiosity, looked down upon by contemporary gourmets. But it was their unpopularity – and hence their low price – that made them attractive.
  8. For a long time, pizzas were scorned by food writers. Associated with the crushing poverty of the lazzaroni, they were frequently denigrated as ‘disgusting’, especially by foreign visitors. In 1831, Samuel Morse – inventor of the telegraph – described pizza as a ‘species of the most nauseating cake … covered over with slices of pomodoro or tomatoes and sprinkled with little fish and black pepper and I know not what other ingredients, it altogether looks like a piece of bread that has been taken reeking out of the sewer’ (I’m not sure sewer pizza is the right positioning?).
  9. When the first cookbooks appeared in the late 19th century, they pointedly ignored pizza. Even those dedicated to Neapolitan cuisine disdained to mention it – despite the fact that the gradual improvement in the lazzaroni’s status had prompted the appearance of the first pizza restaurants.
  10. All that changed after Italian unification. While on a visit to Naples in 1889, King Umberto I and Queen Margherita grew tired of the complicated French dishes they were served for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Hastily summoned to prepare some local specialities for the queen, the pizzaiolo Raffaele Esposito cooked three sorts of pizza: one with lard, caciocavallo and basil; another with cecenielli; and a third with tomatoes, mozzarella and basil. The queen was delighted. Her favorite – the last of the three – was christened pizza margherita in her honor – (I like her, as it’s one of my favorites too!).
  11. This signaled an important shift. Margherita’s seal of approval not only elevated the pizza from being a food fit only for lazzaroni to being something a royal family could enjoy, but also transformed pizza from a local into a truly national dish. It introduced the notion that pizza was a genuinely Italian food – akin to pasta and polenta.
  12. Nevertheless, pizza was slow to move out of Naples. The initial spur was provided by migration. From the 1930s onwards, a growing number of Neapolitans moved northwards in search of work, taking their cuisine with them. This trend was accelerated by war. When Allied soldiers invaded Italy in 1943-4, they were so taken with the pizza they encountered in Campania that they asked for it wherever else they went. But it was tourism – facilitated by the declining cost of travel in the postwar period – that really consolidated pizza’s position as a truly Italian dish. As tourists became increasingly curious about Italian food, restaurants throughout the peninsula started offering more regional specialties – including pizza. The quality was, at first, variable – not every restaurant had a pizza oven. Nevertheless, pizza quickly spread throughout Italy. As it did so, new ingredients were introduced in response to local tastes and the higher prices that customers were now willing to pay.
  13. But it was in America that pizza found its second home. By the end of the 19th century, Italian emigrants had already reached the East Coast; and in 1905, the first pizzeria – Lombardi’s – was opened in New York City. Soon, pizza became an American institution. Spreading across the country in step with the growing pace of urbanization, it was quickly taken up by enterprising restaurateurs (who were often not from an Italian background) and adapted to reflect local tastes, identities and needs.
  14. Shortly after the US entered the Second World War, a Texan named Ike Sewell attempted to attract new customers to his newly opened Chicago pizzeria by offering a much ‘heartier’ version of the dish, complete with a deeper, thicker crust and richer, more abundant toppings – usually with cheese at the bottom and a mountain of chunky tomato sauce heaped on top of it. At about the same time, the Rocky Mountain Pie was developed in Colorado. Although not as deep as its Chicago relative, it had a much wider crust, which was meant to be eaten with honey as a desert. In time, these were even joined by a Hawaiian version, topped with ham and pineapple – much to the bewilderment of Neapolitans.
  15. From the 1950s onwards, the rapid pace of economic and technological change in the US transformed the pizza even more radically. Two changes are worthy of note. The first was the ‘domestication’ of pizza. As disposable incomes grew, fridges and freezers became increasingly common and demand for ‘convenience’ foods grew – prompting the development of the frozen pizza. Designed to be taken home and cooked at will, this required changes to be made to the recipe. Instead of being scattered with generous slices of tomato, the base was now smothered with a smooth tomato paste, which served to prevent the dough from drying out during oven cooking; and new cheeses had to be developed to withstand freezing. (Americans spend about $4.5 billion on frozen pizza each year).
  16. The second change was the ‘commercialization’ of pizza. With the growing availability of cars and motorcycles, it became possible to deliver freshly cooked food to customers’ doors – and pizza was among the first dishes to be served up. In 1960, Tom and James Monaghan founded ‘Dominik’s’ in Michigan and, after winning a reputation for speedy delivery, took their company – which they renamed ‘Domino’s’ – nationwide. They and their competitors expanded abroad, so that now there is scarcely a city in the world where they cannot be found.
  17. Paradoxically, the effect of these changes was to make pizza both more standardized and more susceptible to variation. While the form – a dough base, topped with thin layers of tomato and cheese – became more firmly entrenched, the need to appeal to customers’ desire for novelty led to ever more elaborate varieties being offered, so that now Pizza Hut in Poland sells a spicy ‘Indian’ version and Domino’s in Japan has developed an ‘Elvis’ pizza, with just about everything on it.
  18. Today’s pizzas are far removed from those of the lazzaroni; and many pizza purists – especially in Naples – balk at some of the more outlandish toppings that are now on offer. But pizza is still recognizable as pizza and centuries of social, economic and technological change are baked into every slice.
  19. Let the debate begin. – rankings on favorite toppings

 

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DO YOU LIKE CONTESTS?
Me, too.

As you may know the Kowalski Heat Treating logo finds its way
into the visuals of my Friday posts.
I.  Love.  My.  Logo.
One week there could be three logos.
The next week there could be 15 logos.
And sometimes the logo is very small or just a partial logo showing.
But there are always logos in some of the pictures.
So, I challenge you, my beloved readers, to count them and send me a
quick email with the total number of logos in the Friday post.
On the following Tuesday I’ll pick a winner from the correct answers
and send that lucky person some great KHT swag.
So, start counting and good luck!  
Oh, and the logos at the very top header don’t count.
Got it? Good.  :-))))
Have fun!!

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Gone Fishin’

Lake Erie fishing is a sport and a pastime that appeals to young & old, male & female, novice & competitive angler. Check out that whopper on the right side of row eight above. That’s a 51.5-inch Muskie. WOW!!!!!!!  Me? I’ll be at the grill with some sides ready to whip-up a tasty Walleye or Perch dinner. Yummmm!!!!!!! :))))

Now that the lake is starting to clear, and the ice is headed east, it’s time to get out the boat (or call a buddy with a boat) and do some fishin’.  Lake Erie fishing, especially for perch and walleye, is some of the most prized angling in the United States and the best fishing in Ohio. Anglers often carefully watch the fishing reports to plan annual treks to Lake Erie, sometimes several times a year, to enjoy the chance at catching an impressive haul after a day or weekend on the water.  I know that serious anglers love heading out really early in the morning (it’s my favorite time of the day!) when the water is calm, and the fishies are biting. I on the other hand will be glad to get the skillet or grill fired up!  I am not a fisherman, something about bobbing on the water doesn’t work well for my constitution!  Here is some good info for the novice fisherman, along with links for charters, and more.  So, call some buds, grab a hat and some sunscreen, light snacks, and head on out to enjoy the day.  Thanks to eriecharter.com, lakeeriewalleyecharterfishing.com, and planetware.com.  Enjoy, and call me when it’s time to eat!!

Play this tune while you read to get you in the mood.

Lake Erie is the fourth largest of the five Great Lakes serving as the international boundary between the United States and Canada. On a clear day on the open water, you can see the mainland of Canada and the Lake Erie islands.

Lake Erie is the shallowest of the Great Lakes, and the entire shoreline stretches for 871 miles, touching the US state borders of Ohio, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and New York. There are so many fishing opportunities in this body of water, but most anglers come specifically for the walleye and perch.

In order to enjoy the best fishing that Lake Erie has to offer, you either need to hire a Lake Erie fishing charter, which is easy to do, or know a private captain who can take you. Fishing with an experienced captain on Lake Erie is essential.  Here’s some links: Try This and This

The weather conditions on the water are finicky, and the fishing regulations are strict. Having knowledge of the lake and its islands allows you to safely fish in just about any weather.

Lake Erie regulars know that the bait shop intel is some of the best information available. The walleye and perch are constantly on the move, and while most captains will know generally where they should be throughout the year, their specific locations and bite action will change by the day and oftentimes by the hour.

A favorite of Lake Erie fishing is perch.  Anglers say the best set-up is the hook sinker with a worm bait. Although you can also use a spinner tipped with a worm or a small jig head with a worm or minnow bait. Perch fishing with worms tends to produce the best results, but maggots, prawns and lobworms are also amongst the best bait for catching perch. Recently released Ohio Department of Natural Resources yellow perch hatch results indicate more of the same: overall mediocrity, leaning toward the not-so-good side.     )Depending on the fishing zones you choose, you will likely experience different results.

Many anglers also head to Lake Erie for the prized walleye. Walleye require different bait and fishing methods. Strict bag limit and size regulations for walleyes keep the fish populations in Lake Erie in check. It’s one of the reasons that the walleyes in these basins are able to grow to such large sizes.  People come from all over the region and US to fish for walleyes in Lake Erie, especially in the early spring and fall. The sheer quantity of fish and relative unavailability in the supermarket make it a popular sport fish.

There are various techniques used for getting bait into the strike zone for walleyes. Trolling is a common method that enables anglers to use crank/stick baits in the spring and fall and spoons and nightcrawler harnesses in the summer. All Lake Erie anglers have their own preferences when it comes to the use of planer boards, divers, downriggers, weighted spinners, or flatlining while targeting walleyes.

1. What to Know Before You Go. Lake Erie fishing is exciting, and you will relive the trip with every bite of perch and walleye that you cook for dinner, but there are some key things to know before you go. First things first: educate yourself on the Lake Erie fishing regulations. Since bag limits are reviewed each year, it is important to know what they are for the species that you are targeting, as the regulations are strict.

2.  Be sure to obtain a valid Ohio fishing license from the Ohio Department of Natural Resources or from the state you will be fishing from. Lake Erie is surrounded by the US states of Ohio, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and New York, which all have their own regulations and fishing license requirements.

3.  If you are susceptible to sea sickness, be sure to wear a motion-sickness patch or take motion-sickness prevention pills with you. The Lake Erie waters can mimic the ocean in inclement or windy weather, making for a rocky day on the boat. Hence the reason I do the cooking!!

4.  Hiring a Lake Erie fishing charter is easy to do, and it is one of the best ways to make sure you get right on top of the fish that you want to target. There are several types of charters available depending on your preference. You can hire a private charter, which is more expensive and generally takes groups of four to six people by pre-booking.

5.  Another option for Lake Erie fishing charters are walk-on head boats, where you just show up and go. These are nice options for people who decide to go fishing at the last minute because they are convenient. They are also more affordable than private charters, making them great options for families and groups who are on a budget.

6. Where to Depart. Lake Erie has three main basins from which anglers generally depart to fish for perch and walleye. Port Clinton is the Walleye Capital of the World, so it is the go-to launch for the Western Basin and that is where you will find the largest concentration of Lake Erie fishing charters. The Western Basin is productive in the spring during spawning season and in the fall.  The Central Basin, stretching along the northeastern Ohio border and part of Pennsylvania, is popular in the late spring and summer. Popular Ohio departures for the Central Basin include Huron, Lorain, Fairport, Geneva-on-the-Lake, Ashtabula, and Conneaut.  The Eastern Basin stretches from Pennsylvania to New York and Canada.

7.  Other Fish to Catch on Lake Erie. when it comes to Lake Erie fishing, there are other species that are great to target as well. Here are some of the other species that are likely to make an appearance:

Smallmouth Bass. The smallmouth bass in Lake Erie are a popular species for anglers. There are some strict regulations regarding smallmouth bass to help the populations get through spawning season, so you will want to review those if you plan to fish for this species in the spring or early summer. Smallmouth bass can be fun to catch, as they are active fighters and oftentimes jet out of the water.

Steelhead. Anglers enjoy fishing for steelhead because they are quite aggressive on the line. They also make for great table fare. The Ohio Division of Wildlife has been releasing steelhead trout in Lake Erie since the mid 90s, and they have become a popular fish for anglers.

Lake Trout. Lake Erie lake trout can grow quite large and are nice to catch. They are stocked in Ohio waters, so there are generally healthy populations.

Sheepshead. Often considered by anglers to be a junk fish, sheepshead are exciting to catch. These are quite popular to get on the end of your line while fishing for something else. Most anglers do not keep sheepshead, but they provide a lively intermission to your day of fishing.

8.  Planning a Lake Erie fishing trip is fairly simple and can become a yearly tradition as it is for so many anglers. Start your planning by deciding what type of species you want to fish for, as that will determine the time of year to go and the location of your departure.

If possible, give yourself a couple of days to make the most of the trip and ensure you have an ice chest full of fish to take home. At the very least, if one day is all you can do, try to plan the trip when you have the most flexibility to change the date if weather conditions are not favorable. Keep in mind that the captain has the final say when it comes to assessing the weather conditions.

Look up local resources like the Lake Erie Shore & Islands to find information on things to do in the area, lodging, and restaurants that you can plan to visit during your stay. They also provide daily weather and fishing reports that you can check before and during your time on the water.

Catch & Cook with Robert Field

How to Get a Fishing License in Ohio with pictures

 

::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

DO YOU LIKE CONTESTS?
Me, too.

As you may know the Kowalski Heat Treating logo finds its way
into the visuals of my Friday posts.
I.  Love.  My.  Logo.
One week there could be three logos.
The next week there could be 15 logos.
And sometimes the logo is very small or just a partial logo showing.
But there are always logos in some of the pictures.
So, I challenge you, my beloved readers, to count them and send me a
quick email with the total number of logos in the Friday post.
On the following Tuesday I’ll pick a winner from the correct answers
and send that lucky person some great KHT swag.
So, start counting and good luck!  
Oh, and the logos at the very top header don’t count.
Got it? Good.  :-))))
Have fun!!

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