Sausage, Egg and Hollandaise Breakfast Pizza

There's this local chain that we went to recently that really surprised me. I'm not used to being pleasantly surprised by chains. They tend to be bland, umimaginative, poor service, overpriced money pits of consumerism. Now Mikes Restaurants is not an exception. We waited far too long in line before the understaffed staff finally sat us down at a table that had been empty since we'd walked in. But that was the end of our troubles. Our server was great.

All my friends encouraged me to take a breakfast pizza. And, like I said, I was really surprised. The idea of putting everything you would find in a breakfast on a pizza, douse it with hollandaise sauce and melted cheese and place it alongside a bit of fruit and some homefries is simply genius. So being the person who I am, I decided that I would make my own. I'd even make it better. Truth be told, chains aren't very difficult to beat.

First I prepared my pizza dough from scratch...more on that in a later post. I then prepared hollandaise sauce which, it turns out, is egg yolks, butter and lemon juice. Really fattening but oh so delicious. As far as toppings go, I sautéed some mushrooms, onions and sausage after which I scrambled some eggs. Everything went on the semi-baked pizza crust, topped with the sauce, sprinkled with cheese and enjoyed with a tall cup of coffee.

Was it better than what they had at the chain restaurant? Of course. And the victory was as easy as I'd predicted.

Spaghetti Gratiné & Personal Pita Pizzas

We've almost always eaten our spaghetti with a mound of broiled cheese on top. It's obviously heavier on the fattiness side but it's really worth it. All you do is preheat your the broiler of your oven, put your cooked spaghetti in an oven proof plate, top with you favourite spaghetti sauce recipe and then add grated cheese. Pop it in the oven till the cheese is brown and bubbly and then serve the hot plate in another plate so that it doesn't burn your table. This recipe is simple but really good for those comfort food days.

Though spaghetti gratiné was a stolen idea, our recipe for pita pizzas is original - meaning that we didn't find it in a cookbook or anything. What you need for these are greek style pitas (i.e. not pocket pitas), some canned pizza sauce, and your toppings of choice. What's great about this is that everyone can have what they want on their own individual pizza. So for all of you parents out there, this is one of the really kid friendly meals.

Before you put your pita pizzas in the oven, you need to prepare your ingredients. Chopped tomatoes, mushrooms, ham, cooked bacon, onions, olives, peppers, pepperoni, grated moza cheese, feta, artichoke hearts, proscuitto, smoked herring or salmon, hot peppers, and pretty much anything else you can think of are great ingredients. The best thing is that everyone has choice and variety enough to satisfy everyone's eating habits.

These and other really obvious meals brought to you by Pat, the future owner of Stone Spoon Bistro.