Pizza! Pizza!

I'm not what one might call a "chef". Sure, I like to experiment from time to time with fancy recipes and techniques, but for the most part...I fake it.

Last night, however, I NAILED IT.

Barbecue chicken pizza is one of my all time favorite things. I will order it 85% of the time when we're out and it's on the menu. It's also one of the few things that's equally as delicious in salad form. So, I gave it a whirl in my own kitchen.

The BBQ chicken itself is a staple in our house, mostly because it's so easy and mindless. I take 2 frozen chicken breasts and pop them in the crock pot for 3 hours (on high) or 7 hours (on low) with 6 (generous) ounces of Sweet Baby Ray's BBQ Sauce, 1/4 cup italian dressing, 2T brown sugar and 1T Worcestershie sauce. Once the chicken is cooked through, I take two forks and shred it and let it simmer on low/warm for another 30 minutes or so. DELISH.

For the pizza, it literally took 7 minutes to make it. I bought the pre-made dough, available where you'd find the cans of Pillsbury rolls. We were feeling fancy, so we used the artisan wheat variety.

I followed the directions on the tube and pre-baked the dough for 6 minutes. I popped it out of the oven and added the chicken and sauce from the crock pot. Then I added some sliced tomatoes, avacado, fresh cilantro, corn from 1 ear, fresh and shredded mozzarella and baked it for another 8 minutes.

Joey said it was one of my top 3 meals, ever. Which isn't an accomplishment in and of itself, mind you, but the man does have tastebuds!

This was after we devoured half of it. I have reason to believe the corn was the MVP. Unexpected on a pizza, but SO YUM.

C. All of the above.

As you may recall from this post, Alex is pretty spectacular when it comes to answering questions and getting the answer right.

So last night when Joe and I were struggling with a restaurant selection for dinner, we naturally turned to our brilliant son to narrow our two finalists down to one.

"Alex, do you want Five Guys or Logan's?"

"Logan's."

Another test, just to be sure.

"Alex, do you want Logan's or Five Guys?"

"Five Guys."

Hmmph.

"Alex, do you want steak or hamburgers?"

"Hamburgers."

"Alex, do you want hamburgers or steak?"

"Steak."

'Twould appear that our little smartiebucket was just selecting the second option we gave him. So Joe tried another test...

"Alex, who do you love more, Daddy or Mommy?"

"Mommy."

"Alex, who do you love more, Mommy or Daddy?"

"Mommy."

BOO YEAH.

_______________________

And because smart kids wear suspenders, here's an extra helping of cute for you today.

Last Night's Menu.

And no, I didn't cook it. Duh.

Twice a year, the fancy schmancy restaurants in Detroit host Detroit Restaurant Week. During this time, each participating restaurant features a 3 course set menu (some with a few choices per course) for $28. For wanna-be foodies like Joe and me, there's really no better way to try these restaurants than during DRW.

This time around, we tried Iridescence at the MotorCity Casino and Hotel. Um, hello? It's gorgeous. And delicious.

First up? Drinks. Specifically...vino. I ordered the "Adventures in Red," which was a super fun sampling of 4 different reds, complete with a little snacky-snack bowl of nuts, fancy cheeses and prosciutto. Notsomuch on the snack bowl, but the wine was fab.

Next, the chef delivered his "amuse bouche" to the table, which is just a fancy way of saying it's a chef's choice single-bite hors o'euvre. Ours was prosciutto, brie cheese and some greens with a balsamic "swoosh" across the plate. It even came with a tiny fork! Swoon.

For our appetizer course, Joey had the Sautéed Jumbo Lump Crab Cake (fennel pollen remoulade, cucumber, tomato, crispy corn tortilla*...not a shocker if you know him) and I opted for the Onion Soup Gratin (cippollini, pearl, vidalia onions, bells porter, comte crostini). VERY cool presentation - they poured it tableside!

For the main course, Joey got the Sautéed Atlantic Salmon (braised salsify, jerusalem artichoke purée, roasted brussels sprouts, wild mushrooms, roasted garlic beurre blanc) and I had the Potato Truffle Ravioli (peas and carrots, parmesan and mushroom cream).

For dessert, the only option on the DRW menu was a Sweet Potato Custard (cinnamon mousse, pecan pie ice cream), and it was delish. However, we couldn't resist ordering an extra Peanut Butter Bar (caramelized banana, chocolate peanut butter) which I'm still having dreams about. Oh, and they delivered hot towels just prior to this course for us to wash our hands. Be still my beating heart.

As it grew darker, the view from our windowside table grew more and more beautiful. Detroit doesn't often get the respect it deserves for being a relatively cool city, but I'm here to give it some props. Well done, D.

*And don't think for a minute (except for the peanut butter sauce) that I have the slightest idea what any of the italicized descriptors mean. Those are total copy/paste jobs from the Iridescence website.

Toot. Toot.

I made this for dinner last night and it was SCRUMPTIOUS. The word "easy" was in the working title of the recipe, so I really couldn't resist. I used about a 2 lb. roast, though, because 4 could feed us for a week. I also added 'shrooms, because we love us some 'shrooms in the VW house. Not like THAT, sillies!

There's just something about walking in the front door (after a heinous day at work) to the smell of a delicious dinner that's ready to eat. If Yankee could bottle that scent up for a candle they'd make bazillions!

In unrelated news, the disgusting and mysterious at-work nail clipper is back with a vengeance. And since I sit mostly near dudes, odds are good that it's a grown man clip, clip, clipping his scurvy nails in my very presence. Seriously. Who does that? Save it for the privacy of your own home, man!

In other unrelated news, I did some more research and it seems that the minimum requirement for Locks of Love is 10 inches, not 8 as I mentioned in this post. Would it be weird to start taking my prenatal vitamins again to help it grow faster?